I don't buy that unencrypted traffic is equally trustworthy. Encrypted traffic cannot easily be snooped by a man in the middle. It's arguably the entire point

I don't buy that unencrypted traffic is equally trustworthy. Encrypted traffic cannot easily be snooped by a man in the middle. It's arguably the entire point of HTTPS. With HTTP, I have no hints, much less guarantees, that the website I'm talking to is actually who it says it is. There is no mechanism whatsoever to establish trust, and my traffic is up for easy analysis. HTTPS may not fix that problem completely (CAs are the biggest weak point) but it does wonders to solve MITM type snooping of my traffic (a boon to me, as a user) and has the mechanisms in place for me to inspect the certificate chain if I need to be sure of the server I'm communicating with. I agree with a great many of your criticisms against the standard and feel like CAs in particular need to be re-thought, but don't dismiss the entire technology because you assume that the "user" is too stupid to know how to use it.