big chunks of population are regulated ...

This is appeal to authority, the ligitimicy, correctness and, "goodness" of the items you've listed are in constant flux and under heavy dibate.

firearms are regulated ... Even internet access is super controlled

These two in particular are a powder keg. US politics likes the former (a lot) and, lemmy is attracted to the latter.

AI is already regulated. Just because something is new (to the public) does not mean that laws don't apply to it. We don't need regulation for the sake of regulation.

There's a lot of AI regulation that may become necessary one day. For example, maybe we should have a right to an AI assistant, like there is a right to legal counsel today. Should we be thinking about the minimum compute to assign to public defense AIs?

This is for models that cost 100 million dollars to train.

Or take a certain amount of compute. Right now, this covers no models. Between progress and inflation, it will eventually cover all models. At some point between no and then, the makers of such laws will be cursed as AI illiterate fools, like we curse computer illiterate boomers today.

Think about this example you gave: Cars are regulated

We regulate cars, and implicitly the software in it. We do not regulate software in the abstract. We don't monitor mechanics or engineers. People are encouraged to learn and to become educated.