The two issues I see are:
1) The bad guys might still be able to get the key (as the article discusses)
2) We don't know who the 'good guys' are. It's very comforting to think that there's some mysterious superhero who will only fight for good but this ignores the large issue: no one can really agree on what "good" is.
This is the same key escrow battle we had when cryptography was first propagated: "Oh no, it actually works, and we can't trivially break it, it'll be the end of the world!". Only this time, the battle is "Oh no, it actually works for people who aren't technically savvy, it'll be the end of the world!".
The answer is the same now as it was then: no, go away, we're building solutions that work and you're asking us to make them broken.
Still, if we start arguing that maybe your government is the bad guy, certainly we won't convince the government. Also we won't convince the people who blindly trust the government.
Therefore, it might actually be most productive to avoid point number 2, as valid as it is, and take as premise that the government & Apple are both currently good guys. And then still convince a secure golden key is a bad idea.
With this in mind, the closest I dared to get was the discussion of the future. Governments do change. Whoever has access to your golden key might be a bad guy tomorrow, or invaded by a bad guy.
Btw, I even took out a whole section about questionably lawful warrants before publishing. For this reason.
There are only some guys, who try to be good, but so many fail.
It's very depressing to see constant regurgitation of cops-and-robbers morality.
The FBI has deep historic ties to the Pinkertons, and has historically spent at least half of its resources (conservatively) on anti-radicalism. The DEA is so deeply interwound with the CIA that half of the drug dealers in the world are protected and immune.
Local police forces are the only entity that is serious about "fighting crime," and their trustworthiness is inconsistent from region to region, to say the least. When you consider that the largest, most economically damaging crimes are being committed by banks and hedge funds, we can basically conclude that society is preyed upon by forces that have no counter.
Instead, we're arguing over a fantasy that somehow we need the police and FBI to protect us, thereby meaning we have to give up whatever meager protections we have against them.
I'm no Apple fan. In fact I'm still incredulous that this really means what they say it does -- that iDevices are secure by default. But if it's actually true, then freaking HOORAY FOR APPLE. Enjoy it while it lasts.
we can basically conclude that society is preyed upon by forces that have no counter.