Conformance definitions- issues

The definition of the levels  capture two ideas and raise some questions:
1. Level 1 helps to achieve minimum  accessibility and level 2 and 3 enhance them. If a guideline does not have a level 1 criteria, can it  be said that minimum accessibility cannot be  attained for that guideline?
2. I think the  primary  distinction between the levels  (at least 1 and 2) is to bring out the method  adopted by content author   to incorporate accessibility and comply with a guideline. When content is accessible from the user's perspective, how does  the  _method_ adopted  by the author  to make this happen make the web content eligible for a lower (level 1) or higher (level 2) grade? If a guideline does not have level 1 criteria, can it pole vault to  "enhanced accessibility level" without attaining minimum level because the author directly made changes to content / presentation?

3. The level 1 or 2 or 3  should  solely indicate accessibility level going from basic to high to highest and mixxing it with  the method adopted  to attain accessibility confuses the conformance levels.
The quality of any item or service is  measured by the value to the user and usability of the item or service and not by what effort went into it or what   method was adopted in producing it.  
I had brought this up in a comment on the June 2003 draft  as well.
Why is accessible Web content different? One reason can be diversity among users and methods used to surf the Web. But what is accessible to widest audience  based on accessibility principle should be given level 3rating  and  other content lower down.

I seem to feel strongly  about above issues and have reiterated them  for consideration.
Sailesh Panchang
Senior Accessibility Engineer 
Deque Systems,11180  Sunrise Valley Drive, 
4th Floor, Reston VA 20191
Tel: 703-225-0380 Extension 105 
E-mail: sailesh.panchang@deque.com
Fax: 703-225-0387
* Look up <http://www.deque.com> *