Well the reason you're all making such a song & dance about the ION of POSITION is that it isn't ION(ESCU) ... you're all ignoring the "back" NO.1 back = ION, and I think No.1 is a reasonable leader.
BTW I wouldn't dream of using Ion Iliescu, the Romanian leader in such a context without at least pointing to the country, for as rab says such clues are wildly unfair. I also agree about some of the other vague letter clues - one of the most annoying being "notes" for any of the letters A,B,C,D,E,F,G - If that's allowable (and it generally is) then you might as well allow "letters" and have all 26 !
[Blob] Fair do's. It was a practice worth highlighting, even if it transpired that you weren't guilty, your honour. But "note" is a single choice of 8. Unless you start including the tonic sol-fa I guess... so although I think this should probably be frowned upon, I would say that if you have less than about a dozen choices you're doing ok. However "boy" expands to a list that spans about 20 pages in my Crossword dictionary and should be banned.
[rab] I accept your grovelling apology ;-) Re notes - 8 ? Er, 7 I think ... and yes I suppose 7 ain't too bad. But if it's three such notes then you're up to 343 possible combinations. Re names - well yes, but usually it boils down to just a few (Sid, Tim & Ian being the favorites) and names such as IGOR are usually clued as "Russian" - but in principle I agree that they are a scoundrel's tactic.