Tim Swanson (who understands bitcoin's economy much better than most bitcoin gurus) is looking at the miners as an entity that performs a service to the "bitcoin system" (validating and securing transactions) in return for a payment (the block rewards and transaction fees).
That's where you and Tim are mistaken prof. You are completely ignoring the main function of the block reward, which is to distribute the tokens.
That may be
one intended function of the block reward; but now it is effectively the main payment that miners get for their work.
(It is far from ideal for both purposes, though. The 25 BTC reward would be adequate if the price was in the single-digit range; which would be the case, if Satoshi had not been brainwashed by his libertarian friends with that Austrian Economics fiction about deflationary money...)
Thanks to Marcus for bringing my attention to something I had missed.
I'm curious about that bolded part. What, in your opinion, would be a more "ideal" distribution method?