Personally, I don't see much point in using Flash for buttons, navigation, etc.
Agreed. But for most websites (ones not specializing in graphical representation, i.e. galleries), the place of flash is mostly restricted to three things:
- rollovers
- splash page
- loading placeholders.
Rollovers you already said it about.
Loading placeholders can be done with other technology (animated gif+script), which takes less space and time to make.
Splash page -- eh, okay. But the splash page is not even there half the time.