I mean, I'm not totally against a one-time increase if we really need it. But what I don't want to see is an increase used as a way to avoid the harder issue of creating alternatives to on-chain transactions. For one thing, Bitcoin will never make for a good micropayments system, yet people want Bitcoin to be one. We're much better off if people work on off-chain payment systems that complement Bitcoin, and there are plenty of ways, like remote attestation capable trusted hardware and fidelity bonds, that allow such systems to be made without requiring trust in central authorities.
This is exactly how I see it too!
In this thread I'm a bit disappointed in Gavin. I used to see him as a very conservative project leader, only including changes when there's community consensus about it and no doubt about its security implications. And I liked that, even though it meant that some of the changes I support are not going to be included. For a monetary system, trust and stability are essential, and I hope Gavin will continue to provide that trust and stability, so hopefully he just considers abandoning the transaction limit as an academic "thought experiment", and not something he is planning to actually put into the code in the near term.
I'm afraid Gavin still has this "low-fee micropayment" idea of Bitcoin. Gavin, if you read this: please abandon that idea. It stops you from seeing clearly where Bitcoin is useful and where it is not useful, so it stops you from developing Bitcoin in a direction that will make it most successful. If you steer towards "low-fee micropayment", you will find yourself in a niche with more efficient competing technologies, where Bitcoin will die. Bitcoin's strength is in store of value; the bulk of microtransactions can and should be done off-chain with other systems.