Everything is Dragons

For a while now, D&D has had a problem with its second D: dragons.  That problem, according to some of the people designing the game and some of the people playing it, was that there weren't enough of them.  Dungeons were everywhere, but dragons? Dragons were high-level monsters - a lot of adventuring parties never survived to see one, and many that did didn't survive the encounter.  The solution, of course, was more dragons.

But now D&D is suffering from a problem I like to call "everything is dragons."  Dragons are terrifying and powerful monsters; encounters with them should be rare and memorable.  Basically, they should inspire awe and fear - an encounter with a dragon should be one of the most dangerous, most tense, most memorable episodes of a campaign.  Unfortunately, the attitude toward dragons expressed by D&D over the past few decades has watered down the threat and the majesty of these iconic monsters.  There are four clear examples of this: kobolds, sorcerers, 3.5 edition's Monster Manual IV, and 4th edition's dragonborn.