I highly respect Dan as well and thank him for his creation and contributions. I also believe in self voting in moderation but there should be a balance of upvoting other accounts as well.
I would really like to resolve the abuse problem without requiring identity verification. Here's an idea- what if a certain number of flags against an account could temorarily suspend a user from voting, flagging, delegating, earning curation rewards and making transfers. After each suspension is up the suspension becomes longer at each subsequent offense by that account. After a certain number of suspensions the flags begin taking away Steem Power from the offender permanently in accordance with the number of votes, the flaggers' Steem power, and reputation score. The offender should still be free to post, earn rewards from other voters and power down if they want to get out while the getting is good. They should not be able to vote, flag, delegate, earn curation awards or transfer Steem during the suspensions. This would require a coordinated, community-approved flagging campaign with hundreds or thousands of accounts voting. Those that are in favor of the account and it's alleged abuse should be able to organize a counter campaign which could be weighted to reputation score first and maybe Steem Power last.
In addition, after the suspension ends a suspension of flaging power should continue for a period of time to reduce the risk of retribution, with increased flagging suspenion periods between suspensions.
Basically, this would be a structured way of flagging an account instead of flagging a post.