> If it's not a bug in distutils1, I imagine it will not be a bug in distutils2

Yes that would be a feature request. we would be happy to add. e.g. make the commands works with server X ou server Y.


> I also don't see distutils2 in this list http://svn.python.org/projects/  which means either distutils2 isn't part of the standard library, or it doesn't follow the documented patch submission process, or perhaps both? Insight welcome here.

Distutils2 is developed at http://hg.python.org/distutils2 and will be included when ready in the stdlib (circa 3.3), as a distutils replacer. It's in fact the distutils trunk, with lots of changes (some are backward incompatible). It will be installable from 2.4 onward. 

It does not follow the same process. Which I have described in python-dev last week: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2010-November/105772.html