Dude, you're killing me. Reposting the link doesn't help if it doesn't contain what you're claiming.
A previous block explorer, now taken down in favor of one with less granularity, showed that between 4-14 members controlled over 51% of the stake.
Learn basic math.
Some common sense would also help: That block explorer probably showed the forging stake, not the coin ownership.
We know that PoW would be easier to attack if you magically get a 10% stake - since that would likely buy you 51% of all mining.
Incorrect as you assume that markets aren't dynamic, ignoring the costs of electricity, ignoring the alarms raised from amassing such large amounts of asics , ignoring the cost of setting up and maintaining the equipment and doing so in secrecy, ect...
Buying one or two forging pools and one mining facility should totally do the job. I don't see how I miss costs there... those likely run profitable or close to.
Note how for a state actor all this would be in fact easy, undetectable - and basically free.
A small proof of work component is exactly what NXT does.
Again, it would help if you read what you link - would waste less of everyone's time.
This has nothing to do with PoW consensus mechanisms. Next you are going to insinuate hashing itself is "work" thus one should consider all PoS to incorporate the PoW consensus mechanism.
I don't "insinuate" - it's a straight up fact: hashing is work. It has a difficulty - used as protection mechanism. You can't provide blocks for free.
If we must use your twisted definition of PoW than the point still stands: Why does Vitalik insist upon a much more inefficient version of PoW with a hashimoto dagger IO bound PoW consensus mechanism?
The paper you linked doesn't say that. In the blog links you posted he doesn't say that. You're chasing me in circles with your fake references. I'll end responding.
In fact most your links say: he leans towards POS (which checkpoints of several months of age), which you don't want to explain. You're not living up to your own standards.