If higher-staff members CA+ voted for the VP I don't think it would become such a popularity contest and it would protect from a lot of the type of abuse you're speaking of.
Hypothetically I don't feel that my initial suggestion is anymore of a popularity contest or lacking in objectivism than the system that already exists... I can give one very relevant example. Dominic went from permed, to AO which had some pretty hefty permissions just given back to it, then straight to BD. I'm not shitting on him as a person or even saying this is a bad thing necessarily. He's done good work and SG is better for having him but clearly there is some level of subjectivism baked in at every level.
I also think that in the context of the state of the community saying "no one in the community knows everything the BDs do behind the scenes" is kind of a cop out of a statement. It's also worth noting anytime the BD's tend to show their hand and what they're up to it isn't always received well and that happens quite often because A. Some pretty bad decisions have happened and B. You can't always please the people. Mainly A though, it is mainly personal responsibility and not the pickiness of the community. It's not just in big announcements either, its in a lot of the bans and other minutia that goes on.
I think a quick yes to that question isn't really spending the proper time to think about what the situation currently is at SG especially with the context of what you've seen/dealt with here personally over the course of over half a decade.
I really question the efficacy or need of a senior council role at all that isn't interested in the servers or base level of the community, which is what BD is for SG. It is not server manager plus and is not treated like it is when it should be. I also don't agree with equating VP with BD too much or trying to argue it is strictly ceremonial, though I get your point. In the context of my reply to Gentoo here it certainly is not a ceremonial position and carries real weight in that sense.
Despite the fact that BD's are and have always been seen as a council of greybeards if you're someone down on the community level I feel like someone at some point you have been on the other end of BD's being too far away from what's actually going on and because of that the things that happen don't at all match the reality of the situation or the tone of what the community wants/needs. IE. look at the servers and the context of how they've gotten where they are. Staff effort has dissolved for the CS:GO servers and for any servers in general. Where staff in the past would step down or be removed that has not happened and I think that's super irresponsible.
CA is supposed to advise the community but has always been a useless role IMO. It would be smart to address one of the communities most blatant flaws by elevating CA+ to a role that is not ceremonial and can actually decide who gets to be class president when Caution is off living a real life. Also, If we're going to call VP ceremonial then we need to start talking about replacing someone else. No?