You just need to be root to install whack-run, since whack-run requires the setuid flag. Once you've installed whack-run, you can install the applications as an ordinary user.
(yes)
How complex is whack-run? A setuid binary should be sure to minimize its attack surface. It's just a quick look but when I see your shit-ton of .py files and then you say there is setuid involved it does not fill me with lots of confidence.
whack-run is a separate C binary for this very reason: