the damage the incertainty does to the industry is tremendous
Very true, but this is 100% intentional.
If I was in the EU job protection / gravy train racket, I would be doing the same. Fear, uncertainty and doubt are very cheap to spread, and are effective in keeping a lid on foreign reg operations. Throw in some of the
real hassles (like getting FAA checkrides in Europe, the need for a trust, certification hassles on mods) and the job is done
In fact you don't need to spread FUD yourself. Just let pilots do it for you. There is always some pilot forum personality who says your days are numbered. Flying school employees spread this stuff all the time - on forums and to everybody who walks through the door. Most of these people haven't got a clue about the actual regs, actual or proposed.
VFR will always be easy in regulatory terms because ATC retain the "nuclear button" ("remain outside controlled airspace, goodbye"). This takes out all the regulatory emotion out of VFR. It doesn't matter how far you propose to deregulate VFR, professional pilot and ATC representatives will not be bothered, because all this dross can be kept OCAS.
The moment the I-word is used, however, everybody crawls out of the woodwork and requires an I-word-capable pilot to pass the same exams, have the same medical, etc, as the commercial traffic. Superficially one can understand this, but there are many reasons why it is wrong. IFR GA flies in a mostly different airspace, and causes no problems to ATC. Most of the commercial ground school is not relevant to private ops (or to anything else actually but you can't say that
).
I have a bit of reservations about operating an EASA registered plane with a FAA license in an EASA country which is not it's registrar state
The only European country I know of where you can do that is the UK. The UK automatically validates any ICAO PPL for a G-reg, VFR. The others will mostly do validations, but with various daft conditions e.g. you must not be an EU citizen, etc. But this is likely to stop post-2012.
I don't see a huge use for this type of validation however because a Euro PPL is easy to get, especially if you already have an FAA one and loads of hours. The medical is the only possible big issue, but there are not many health issues where the FAA will give it to you but JAA won't - especially
if you can get in under Demonstrated Ability.
I'll pop over to Zurich fairly soon