Author Control

This may already be available somewhere, or even in the works…please let me know either way.
I would like to see some kind of author control as follows.
Editor at level 9 – Can publish new content to site with no problem.
Writers at level 7 – Can only publish in draft mode and level 8, 9, and 10 can edit.
You could probably customize this in the admin interface (i.e. what each level can do).
This would almost be like a virtual news workflow.
I would also like to see a better…much better way of changing the levels (i.e. combo boxes) instead of having to hit that + sign over and over and over.
Sure I could edit that through PHPMyAdmin, but I’m not going to be using the site all the time.
Or, how about even having an edit option for only the admin at level 10 to go in and change names, user names, passwords, e-mail addresses, author level, etc.
The install I’m currently doing is for a group of blind students who have zero desire to touch either code or a database tool.