If we had a decently sophisticated comment system (trn! trn!), it would be feasible for people to choose to not see comments (and answers to those comments) from posters they wanted to avoid.

Yes, writing a greasemonkey script for that purpose is on my todo list. It wouldn't even be that complicated. A few lines added to and remove from the old kibitzer script would do it. But I'll probably not bother until the next obnoxious person gets on my nerves.

.... Wait.... did I just give anyone who wants that feature a motive to flame me? Bother.

Incidentally I would probably include an extra category for people whose comments I want to see except for when they are replying for me. In some cases people can be good at coming up with their own ideas but poor at understanding and replying to those of others. In those cases a coarse mechanism to pick the potentially best without expecting the frustration of predictable straw men would be handy.