Predictable?
"The regulator is not faced with a harsh, but predictable natural environment. He is in a constant struggle with a conscious human adversary, one who may be counted on using all his intelligence and cunning to circumvent and frustrate every technical or administrative or legal tool used to combat or control him because of personal greed, or even malice."
All engineering that interacts with human beings is a struggle against someone that can be counted on using every means possible to defeat it. That's the entire field of human factors engineering, and like the speed of light, "idiot proof" can be approached, but never reached. Robert designs software. Ask him.
There is a reasonable zone for regulation. We've passed it. The regulatory process largely stopped being about "protecting the people" a long time ago. Unfortunately, it's become a mechanism for projecting raw government power, and completely outside the legislative process.
There's a big difference between laws that punish a business from dumping acid into a river, and laws that forbid a business from doing just about anything at all without state permission.