You know... after some thought I'm wondering if Lacus and the DF might not be able to work with that idea. I know a lot of people are wary about the Warden being in their business, and it essentially being the warden's DF. I could see Lacus proposing that they split off from the warden and act entirely on their own. This eliminates the monitoring and infomodding aspect. She for one would feel better about it, especially since we're getting a new, untrusted warden.
Whether the rest of the DF is for that, I guess would be another issue...
The weapons issue could just be decided based on IC circumstances. Maybe people won't even keep their super-powerful weapons in the move. Maybe they will but future people will be limited to what the talented DF members can create for them. Maybe they'll have to ask for weapons individually and that can be entirely independent of whether they join a DF. (Which, again, I think would limit the numbers significantly since many many characters join primarily for a weapon.)
I actually think this move might bring the DF closer to what Lacus sees as a more pure incarnation of the DF -- just a group of people who want to help others. It would eliminate the people who join for weapons or other personal gain because there's no benefit to joining except that you get to help people.