"Simply draconian". Maybe I'm missing something obvious, but from what I read the intent seems to be to ensure that hobby aircraft are being flown the way they've been flown for years. I've flown R/C and been a member of the AMA, so I have some experience here though I'm hardly an expert.
I think the "problem" now is that, thanks to amazing technologies, it's so much easier to fly R/C aircraft than it has ever been. Because of these technologies anyone can learn to fly on their own, and that ends up bypassing the flying clubs and other groups that had, as an effect of their existence, a way to ingrain the principles that allow us to "operate in accordance with a community-based set of safety guidelines and within the programming of a nationwide community-based organization". When Joe Schmoe orders a quad-copter kit off the internet and doesn't have to scale the learning curve, both actual flying and pilot safety, he ends up, on average, more dangerous than those that had the benefit of those groups.
When those groups no longer become the dominant form of 'policing' of the use of these aircraft, it's no great surprise that regulators feel the need to step in to do the job, which doesn't fill me with great confidence.
A better solution, and it may be too late already, would be to get the developers of these aircraft to work with the AMA to get these new pilots involved with the existing R/C community rather than seeing them as something different.
