But as I said, only a fringe minority care even slightly about the things Schneier wants regulated: e.g. data retention. To most people these are very low prior

But as I said, only a fringe minority care even slightly about the things Schneier wants regulated: e.g. data retention. To most people these are very low priorities. Should government actually being empowered here, it will push in the opposite direction he wants, because strong political interests are on the other side. He would probably happier with the outcome of deregulation. And that's politically achievable; what he wants to do with strong regulation, is not. That's my point: Schneier is not dictator. Network regulation would be in his interest, if he could dictate what form it would take; as a minority in a democracy, he's on the wrong end of the regulatory pointy stick. You're right, I'm treating a democracy as competing factions, not as a cooperating monolith ("people fighting themselves" ; "people governing themselves").