Some great conversation, but just as I figured, everyone is looking at this as a reason to attack the AMA, and as much as I agree with most of the negativity about the AMA listed above, my feelings are that they are not the bad guys in this latest attack on our hobby/sport. They are actually trying to defend us, or help us to defend ourselves. The real culprits are the bureaucrats in the FAA and the knuckleheads who buy their grand kids a $1.000 drone for a Christmas present and then allow them to fly them in an unsupervised reckless manner, threatening airplanes, civilians, and whatever. With all the terrorism that we're dealing with now, I'm sure that there are many governmental officials who look at drones of any nature as a terror attack waiting to happen. Whether you like the drones or not, they're here to stay. Unfortunately, as Bob mentioned above, anyone associated with model airplanes of any type is automatically lumped in with the folks flying drones, as unfair as that may be. The amount of money being spent every day on drones is shocking. We walked in to an Apple store the other day just to look around, and sure enough, $1,400 drones sitting right there next to laptops and I phones. Anyone can buy them and I guarantee you, they are never informed of the restrictions involving the safe operation of drones.
"Rumored" things that we may be faced with if this nonsense from the FAA manages to get passed:
Each pilot would be required to take a 60 question "aeronautical" quiz and pay for a FAA "remote pilot license" in order to fly.
Transponders placed in every aircraft.
Can they do it? Can they enforce it? Will it affect those of us who fly C/L? I don't know. I guess if you're not flying R/C or C/L at a registered club, or you're flying on your grandfather's farm somewhere, this won't affect you. I happen to fly R/C and C/L at my local R/C club and it will definitely affect me and many others in a similar situation. My feelings are, if this gets passed, what's next? It seems like we're only a couple of pen strokes away from not being able to fly anything anywhere and that troubles me. I plan on sending in my objections to my local representatives, at least if this nonsense gets passed, I tried to speak my voice.
The really ridiculous thing about all of this is that the people flying drones are mostly unaware of any governmental restrictions because no one tells them about them. They won't hear about all of this, they won't do anything and they'll keep flying their drones in an unsafe, dangerous manner. These are the people that the FAA needs to focus on, not us. Those of us who have been flying model airplanes for most of our lives and never done anything remotely dangerous, will pay the price.