BEagle,
Interested to hear more about the AOPA proposal. I'm guessing it centres around the CPL theor. knowledge requirement for the FI rating, rather than the CPL licence, as I think you can still have a PPL/FI now if you do the ground exams or have mil exemptions? I'm a couple of exams away from passing all my CPL exams with the sole aim of instructing and it has been a really long haul.
Do AOPA also have ideas about the FI course requirements? If not, would we not see floods of PPL instructors, and possible dilution of standards/instructional currency (as perhaps seen in the gliding world? not wanting to be critical there/jumped on - but there has always seemed to be loads of instructors in most clubs doing relatively few instructional hours to me).