>If it is certified kosher, it is either dairy, meat or parve, as you have
stated above.  Usually it is obvious from the product which is most likely.
If not it will be specified next to the kosher symbol.<

What you say is eminently logical.  I guess I tend to overreact whenever I
hear anyone say "if it's kosher then it must be parve."  Far too many
people I have encountered believe this implicitly, without even bothering
to think about the necessity of looking at the label or looking for the D
symbol. Or of understanding the milk and meat distinction in the first
place.   

And then there are all the various certification bodies with their various
symbols.  The U in a circle may be common, but what of the others that
people might find locally?  I have in my files a listing given out by
KASHRUS magazine in 1988 that gives 34 of them, including two CRCs, a COR,
an OV and a DKC.  (Other sources have talked about 50 bodies.)  Would I
recognize that all these mean kosher if I saw one in a store? Do they all
also spell out kosher on the label?  Do all of these also use the D
designation for Dairy?  I have no idea.

So you're quite right.  If people use a little sense, then they should
easily be able to know when a certified kosher product is milk-free. 
But...   Maybe I'm just being too conservative (or too cynical) but in a
short answer I sometimes get dogmatic when there might not be the need. 
Thanks for the amplification.

Steve Carper, author of Milk Is Not for Every Body: Living with Lactose
Intolerance
http://ourworld.compuserve,com/homepages/SteveCarper