The basic problem is this, if you want to edit any layer you find on ArcGIS Online locally you currently have to perform a preprocessing tool on it which will then create a copy of that layer. This is because of the default connection that layers have to their source data which prevents people who don't have editing permissions to a layer to edit it. This is very important when it comes to editing attribute tables specifically.
Currently what I do as a workaround is pairwise clip layers to themself which keeps the data the same while still downloading it locally. There really should be a GUI option that does that instead of having to find a random geoprocessing tool that does it. What it would be called is something like "Detach from source data" and what it would then do is download the data to the geodatabase of the project. This would be an option on the toolbar as well as be an option when you right click a layer in the content pane. Additionally, there could also be a geoprocessing tool that allows you to chose a specific geodatabase to download the layer to instead of the project geodatabase. But I really want to emphasis that the solution to this is not a geoprocessing tool, this needs to be apart of the GUI for it to have any value.
