Horrace - I think some of the "beef" is that many AMA members expected / hoped / wished / believed / thought that the AMA had provided all the detail that the FAA need to promulgate their rules to fulfill the Modernization Act. The need for the FAA (apparently) to publish it's interpretation of some relatively-simple plain language that did not have AMA supporting detail information took the AMA and lots of RC fliers by surprise. Who knows where that perception came from? Nevertheless, we'll now have to "watch" while the AMA tries to do damage control and service recovery to a couple hundred thousand members and the FAA.
I'm not a betting man by nature, but on this one, I'm betting the AMA has been "locked out"....and that the FAA may modify their interpretation of the Rule based on over 2000 comments received as of now....hopefully enough intelligent information will be in those for the FAA to see and learn.
BTW - I *do* hope that I'm in error about the AMA.