It's news that affects a great many people, including nerds. Posting it here gives the self-identified nerds a forum to discuss this news.

I have heard of this, actually, initially as a response to Citizens United. With this ruling, and possibly a few more, we could be seeing a real movement to amend the Constitution by 2020.

Which don't cause abortions, contradictory to their claims. Also they were against preventative methods such as IUDs, which you conveniently left out from your argument.

You know, for important research reasons....

At one point the Catholic church didn't exist, then suddenly it did.

This isn't new and is how it has always been. If 15 years ago you attempted to use your RC for aerial photography, the FAA would consider that a violation. The rest of your examples are also no new.

What does LoS mean when the primary pilot has taken the aircraft to an altitude not discernible by the naked eye? Or when the primary pilot has taken the aircraft beyond LoS?

The FAA DID make that very recommendation. The clarification here is that they are not permitting FPV flight, and are restricting "view of the user" to their natural vision (corrected, if necessary). FPV is the new tech advancement that irresponsible pilots are using to fly in an unsafe manner.

The problem the FAA is currently faced with is that hobbyists aren't flying within a field, AMA or otherwise, but rather exceeding 400 ft, flying over populated areas and highways, and flying into controlled airspace. The only new restriction that the FAA is proposing is removing FPV flying from the domain of "model aircraft", which limits the pilots ability to perform these unsafe activities.

Ars Technica just published an article demonstrating the activities that irresponsible people (the author) do with this technology: link

You don't need an even number of rotors to cancel torque about the yaw axis if you run the rotors at asymmetric rates; tricopters are common in the hobbyist community.

In 2013, an Alitalia pilot identified a quad on the landing path to JFK International: link. There's already reason for concern.

I doubt it is just "a few idiots". The access to these devices has increased to the point where many people can now gain access to them, particularly those who don't give much thought to their actions. Ars Technica got their hands on a DJI Phantom and IMMEDIATELY flew above 400 ft, over other people's property, over crowded areas, over highways, and in dangerous areas (near power lines, etc): link.

The FAA agrees with you and you still retain the ability to fly the craft as a hobbyist, but you must do so below 400 ft and within line of sight (not using FPV). You must not operate the craft for money, nor as a part of a business.

The problem is that when people take their quad out to a park and fly it using FPV, they often go above 400 ft, fly over other people's property, fly over crowded areas, fly over highways, and fly in dangerous areas (near power lines, etc). This isn't a "few bad apples" either, this is the glut of FPV users.

Ars Technica got their hands on a DJI Phantom and IMMEDIATELY did the things I mentioned and wrote about it: link

Some emboldened quad users have been more than willing to put others at risk and fly their aircraft in the landing path of airports. In 2013 an Alitalia pilot identified a quad in the flight path at JFK International Airport, coming within 200 ft of the airplane on it's descent: link

It sounds like you may accounting a little differently than what occurred at my institution. The 40% was taken for administration and overhead; all faculty and student pay, hardware and software, and any other research materials all came out of the remaining 60%. Part of why the ARL balked was because THEY were the administrators and approval had to go through THEM, not the university. There's no reason the university should have taken so much for "administration" they weren't providing.

That's very misleading. After the 1986 Challenger explosion, one of the intended goals of the shuttle, to deploy and maintain spy satellites and equipment, was considered too risky. As a consequence many of these missions were shifted to other launch platforms such as the Delta rocket family. I'd argue that all of these should be considered mission failures, from the shuttle's perspective.