As am I.  Back in the Moneypunk 1.0 days of the 1990s, we imagined that we were going to take down the nation-state, the Illuminati, the Warburg/Rothschild cabal, the Fed, and all the rest with our charming little server-based 'electronic currencies' that were no more database-driven websites that were one subpoena or capricious administrative decision away from being shut down.

Today, even though Bitcoin is distributed and has no single point of failure, the Moneypunk 2.0 community members are much more pragmatic and mature in their approach.  It appears that OECD regulators recognize this and are willing to give those of us who are more interested in making money by the boatload than in taunting Sauron the benefit of the doubt, even if begrudgingly.

Those who are offended by this process can migrate to Perfect Money, any of the alternative *coins, or fork the code and start their own True Scotsman system.  The cat is out of the bag and the horse has left the barn.  The code is in the wild, Satoshi's paper explains what the code does, and one can find countless recommendations for improving the protocol by googling the Bing.

So long as one is not subject to US jurisdiction, this sentiment is a matter of personal taste.  However, if one transacts with Americans and especially if one resides within the USA, this sentiment can lead to unfortunate consequences, unless one has closed all of one's bank and credit card accounts.

Obviously, Bitcoin per se is beyond direct regulation, and all the regulation talk is about the USD/Bitcoin interface.  However, until we can pay for food, clothing, housing, etc. directly with Bitcoin—and I do not mean using Bitcoin to buy Gyft cards, as wonderful a development as that is—we will not escape that interface, if we want to integrate Bitcoin into our financial lives.  One day, perhaps, but not today.

FinCEN, the Fed, the US Treasury, FATF, et al. are notoriously jealous of their legacy system, as profoundly broken as it is, and if we insist on using it, then we will be subject to their regulations and statutes.  I'm not suggesting that this is a good thing.

What do the individuals who bluster impotently on these discussion boards think that they are achieving?  Waggling one's little bottom at Sauron does not make the Forces of Darkness quake in fear.  It makes the community look like a pack of snot-nosed little punks.

Real revolutionaries embrace disruptive engineering, entrepreneurship, and entertainment.

Rather than fling boogers at men with guns, badges, drones, and warrantless wiretaps, we should be spending our efforts developing P2P exchange networks, real financial services (including car loans and mortgages), full-service retail outlets (for food, clothing, and other consumer goods), and large-scale outreach initiatives to get the masses on our side.

Until then, and as long as Mt. Gox 'suffers a DDOS attack' every time someone refreshes its website more than twice in a minute, bluster makes us look silly.

So long as one is not subject to US jurisdiction, this sentiment is a matter of personal taste.

Until then, and as long as Mt. Gox 'suffers a DDOS attack' every time someone refreshes its website more than twice in a minute.

Bitcoin is a currency that knows no borders. They can of course regulate businesses and and their own citizens usage, but they have no authority over the currency itself.

tl;dr
fu america

I don't need permission from them to trade USD<->BTC, nor will I ever. They can jerk themselves off talking about regulations all they want, but they're just going to look dumb when none of it matters.

Ruck fegulations!

Of course they do matter.
They can close down exchanges, they can close down business, and while this won't outright kill Bitcoin, it will make it much less useful and easy to use.

This comes by way of someone close to Bitcoin discussions in Washington, DC.  Apparently, FinCEN agents are looking for members of the Bitcoin community to form a self-regulatory organization with voluntary approval procedures to work with financial regulators.