If we have this in place, cool to have a link...
My thinking is that a constructive and asymptotically approaching perfection (hopefully as rapidly as humanly possible) way of doing a good bit of easing of some of the tensions, would be to start compiling a list of criterions which make someone absolutely 100% a chinch to need a wikipedia article about them, no matter what. Not a list of "articles every wikipedia should have" or anything like that, but a list of no-brainer wikipedia inclusion criteria, and add to the list of criteria as fast as possible. If something is blindingly obvious it is often very easy to get consensus, and a great deal can be achieved in a very short amount of time. Once the low hanging fruit have been collected, the experience of working on that part of the task, often makes for a much more congenial atmosphere to hew out some modus operandi for the cases where things are not so clear as to be universally agreed upon by the editorship.
Here are some I can think of:
* Heads of states of all countries which are official full members of the United Nations, after they have been admitted. * Actresses/Actors who have star billing in a movie released by Universal, MGM, 20th/21th Century, Lucasfilm, (... purposefully leaving this list short to be absolutely ironclad not to step into any point of contention or cheap shots ...) * Nobel Prize winners. * Fields Medal winners. * Medal winners in the Modern Olympics in those sports that currently are part of the Olympic Games, in either winter or summer games. * Military leaders of the armed forces in any conflict between two countries who are currently official full members of the United Nations. * All Popes the Holy Roman Catholic Church currently recognizes as having been valid popes. * All winners of the Booker Prize. * All winners of the Turner Prize. * All presenters of the Royal Society Christmas Lecture. * ... * ... * ...
You get the idea...?