Also I can't believe he doesn't see how problematic voting for mod privileges can be. There's a reason reddit has refused to allow users to vote out moderators in the past. If you allow voting, you allow outsidebrigadier, astroturfing, and also just petty mod squabbling. The solution reddit has always offered in the past was "create your own new subreddit for the idea you want and then get people to come over to it". In general it's worked. The existence of r/pics hasn't disallowed other picture-based subreddits from flourishing, same with r/funny and, well, actually funny subs.

Allowing votes on moderation just opens reddit up to a lot of shenanigans that I don't think the admin team is ready for.