Precisely. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but it really doesn't mesh with the common bitcoin dogma of a virtual currency free of the ability of governments to interfere with it.

There's nothing stopping governments from shutting it down either. The US by itself could practically take it down alone (or any other crypto) by banning US banks from working with it, or from working with any non-US bank that that deals with bitcoin. No need for a 51% attack, no need to track electricity usage to locate potential miners, just a simple piece of legislation. Or even simpler, an executive order issuing the same ban, stating that bitcoin enables significant financial activity by terrorists & criminals.