I don't think we're talking past each other. You and I appear to disagree about the value of a region-wide compromise of smart meters; you point out that at least the grid operator hasn't lost its distribution network when that happens, and I point out "so what? attackers are still randomly cutting off everyone's power!"

The big gap between where you are and where I'm at is that you're operating under the assumption that all the meters do is count stuff. No.