They don't know how to write a post with a minimum quality, if somebody is giving merits to his own alts, if they are giving them to constructive posts, you'll never find out if they are alts of each other.
There is something. charging a fee per post. any forum member not earning a minimum 10 merits in 30 days should pay a fee per post if they are wearing a signature. if they don't want to pay, they could report garbage posts and for every accurate report, they could post one time for free.
1) That is one of the big limitations of the merit system. It was good that members here are able to recognize some merit abuse cases and report them. It happened because merits were sent in bulk like 20 or more for a single post. But, if someone is mart enough , he can still get away without being noticed. Since, all default merits of those cheaters will be spend on alt accounts in batches, this makes the situation more difficult for a new member with only one account
2) That are quite a lot of rules. I am in favor of steps being taken to remove spam from the forum but we should be keeping things simple.