Also, on your quoted statement:
I do not believe the author consider money laundering with bitcoins. Say I steal $500k worth of bitcoins. I contact launder XYZ and he places my $500k worth of coins with $5.5mil worth of coins, then, funnels using smaller amounts to a multitude of addresses back to the thief. Since there are so many transactions to/from in the Launder's wallet, it would be hard to trace past that point where the $500k actually went.
So what does the launderer gain for the risk of taking the loss/blame for the theft? Surely he must impose a healthy fee? Surely this fee would be negotiable based on the good provenance of the coins.
A quick Google of 'bitcoin laundry' shows a typical commission rate of 1.5-3.5% and portion of bitcoins per transaction (to cover the costs of transferring).
I wonder what is to stop a launderer from accepting stolen bitcoins, but then just keeping them. Who would the thief go cry to? Even if the thief complained to the community to harm the launderer's reputation, they would have to tell the community what coins were involved before anybody would listen. Physical retribution, as could/would be used "in meatspace" no longer helps.
Also, on your quoted statement: I do not believe the author consider money laundering with bitcoins. Say I steal $500k worth of bitcoins. I contact launder XYZ and he places my $500k worth of coins with $5.5mil worth of coins, then, funnels using smaller amounts to a multitude of addresses back to the thief. Since there are so many transactions to/from in the Launder's wallet, it would be hard to trace past that point where the $500k actually went.