He says he likes things to be "informal" by which he really means "opaque".
What we don't do is try to answer all the questions in advance. That's for several reasons, the first of which is that it's impossible.
That's opaque.
If there's any information that someone wants to find out about HN or HN moderation, all they need to do is ask us.
Why? Will dang send his goons after me?
dang is simply repeating "my way is better".
Will dang try it?
I don't believe I've ever had sanctions put on my account here (though dang did admonish me, once, among numerous other interactions). But I've had my IP address caught up in bans (I often read HN without logging in), and a few other things.
That is: if you want to know what's happening to your account, you can fall back on the slightly-higher-friction option of asking what's happening. No, it's not there automatically in your account profile, but then, that solution would permit for an attacker to automatically detect (and presumably counter) such information. The soft / opaque / translucent failure mode of HN actually works reasonably well in that context and environment.
NB: I'm in general agreement with many of your concerns about HN, and in particular how it fits and how it is behaving in a rapidly-changing political environment in which HN and YC have a considerable role. But not everything you're proposing bears out, and even some of what does (e.g., opaque limitations on accounts) doesn't work well in a larger context. I do have strong concerns about how HN's comments guidance hits unevenly in political discussion especially. I'm not entirely sure how to best improve on that, though I've been thinking through options and doing some reading (Jurgen Habermass's work in particular).
I've spent about 15 years studying HN (and often being wrong about it). If you'd (again, zfg or others) care to discuss via email my contact info is on my account page.