Trussingdoor is pretty kewl. He fires lasers and doesn't afraid of anything.
No, I think it's fair and should be kept.
I got a permaban. Know what I did? Appealed it. I can only think of one user who has been permabanned and so far failed all of her attempts to appeal, and given the circumstances I understand the mods' reasoning, if I don't agree with it. If you feel like a punishment is excessive, just politely say so (And yes, politely. Wouldn't want to end up on the Whambulance.)
Yes, permabans can be easily bypassed with alts. Anything but an IP ban from bnet can, really. But that's not really a reason to do away with it. Now, the severity of a perma can vary from user to user- someone who isn't involved in any Groups will probably feel like they have been thrown out of Bnet, whereas someone active in a big group will be slightly less affected.
But overall, I think it's good that the moderators have it. Do they use it on the wrong people and hold it away from the right people sometimes? Yes, and IMO more often than is really ok. Should the perma be removed because of this? No.
If any ban changes need to be made, it's the addition of bans of less than 3 days. Maybe a one or two day ban for minor flaming, just enough time to cool down, right? ;)