Based on what Theymos is saying, it seems most practical to attempt to finish nominations within a few days or a week at most, and thereafter create a thread to conduct a vote - maybe a 3-4 days voting period.  Someone who is not running could probably run the vote.

I'm sure any voting would end up picking a decent candidate that would be in touch with thread culture, and if that person believes s/he needs help in the thread, s/he can elicit such help - even though it seems that there may be some inability to give actual powers to anyone beyond the owner of the thread, unless the owner of the thread shared his/her log-in credentials or a administrative "fake" account was created for such persons and the password only known by the elected moderator(s).

I am not sure if there should be concerns about getting stuck with a tyrant, because we would be voting for the person, but if there is a feeling to allow for a continued quasi-democratic process, we may want to agree to 1 year terms or something reasonable like that.   It sounds like Theymos would agree to a variety of frameworks, as long as the thread is set up with one owner and is not taxing mod resources too heavily... and it seems that even if Theymos would allow some administrative account, some one person is going to have to end up taking responsibility for the whole way that the thread is administered - so one point person.