See now you're getting to the point but the point is that public transport is broken so we're patching it with cars. Perhaps we should be fixing that instead?
What's the argument then? Is everyone expected to wait around until public transit is fixed before they work on something else?
AVs are complementary to public transit. You're not going to take a robotaxi from SF to SJ. You might take one to the Caltrain station on either end and avoid needing a personal vehicle at all.
Autonomous vehicles promise to expand individual car ownership to some groups that would normally be forced to rely on public transit (people disabled in a way that prevents them from driving, or repeat drunk drivers, for example). For the able-bodied, they promise the relaxed luxury of "someone/thing else is driving and I can work/read/relax" that public transport offers, without having to actually build public transport.
This means the people with the strongest vested interests in public transit are already relatively outcast and underclass, and it will only get worse.
Make the rich and powerful have to take a bus, and suddenly it will become a significant political concern that the schedule is a loose suggestion at best, and that nobody has cleaned the bus since George VI was on the throne.
It would be interesting to expand on your last point-- an AV fleet that compliments public transit as a last-mile offering-- but it doesn't seem to be the model we're seeing sold right now. It's the same old vehicle designs clearly intended for single-family use, long trip times, and low duty cycle. I would imagine an AV system built as a "compliment" might involve small, slow vehicles, almost glorified bumper cars, with like 25km battery range, since the target application is to drive from the train station to a home/office, then return to the station for a battery swap and service. While each trip is a light task, a single vehicle might go on dozens of trips per day and as a result get a completely different wear pattern than your typical Hyundai.
It would help if local leadership could say "You're building a business that has high flexibility in where you site it, so you should place it near a transport hub, rather than off in a suburb that causes a longer average commute for everyone."
Yes, you can't do this for every business-- some have natural dependencies on specific site characteristics, but those seem likely to shape the rest of the city's transport decisions (how many cities have major thoroughfares that parallel existing heavy rail, for example)
He sits on the sidelines for all the billions of problems which are not heavily subsidised by the government in one way or another.
The fearless QB who only takes the field when the team has a 48 points lead and for Uncle Sam's team with uncapped salary ceiling.
A true underdog story. Move over Kurt Warner. Not.
This absurdist comparison isn't to say Musk is as bad as ISIS, but rather action shouldn't be confused with helping.