>I'm going to hold every other employer to the same standard "I never had a problem with this request with any other employer, why would you want to refuse?"

I love that! I'm totally going with that next time :D Also, I'll probably throw in something like, "I'm surprised you say nobody else has mentioned it. This problem applies to anyone using open source code, which is basically everyone. Do you really want to hire developers who pay so little attention to details?"