Coverage like this (from 2016 in this case, well before either car shipped) was pervasive:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-bolts-range-is-a-buzz-kill-...
Just read that and keep in mind the actual cars that shipped, and their sales volume. Also keep in mind how the framing of the argument ("Tesla's clock is ticking") is almost identical to the grandparent post written five years later!
I don't know that it's really worth arguing that the tenor of Tesla coverage in business and auto press has been outrageously negative for years and years. And... it's been wrong basically every time.
And yeah, a common thing said is that major automakers will just crush Tesla when they decide to make electric cars. But Tesla is now producing almost 1 million EVs per year. This is no longer a company that doesn't know what they're doing when it comes to mass manufacturing, and it has turned out to be much harder to market and manufacture a lot of compelling EVs even for major automakers like GM (see the Bolt recalls... I'm not worried about GM long term just due to this recall, but it should make it clear it's not trivial for a traditional automaker to bring an EV to mass manufacture).
2011: https://www.businessinsider.com/nissan-esflow-photos-2011-2# 2013: https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1088628_chevy-volt-owne...
2014: https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/bmw-s-tesla-kill... Bolt being called the Tesla killer in 2015: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2015/01/11/gm-chev...
...and that's enough. It's most certainly not a strawman after a decade of these predictions being wrong and, if anything, Tesla is more dominant in EVs than ever.
Said who? There are a lot of people out there saying all kinds of things on the internet. This is nothing more than a strawman argument.
Personally, I was never under the impression that the Bolt EV was going to "kill" Tesla, but I can only speak for myself.
Anyways, that's all tangential. Just about every major automaker has announced that they are transitioning to EVs within the next decade or so. Further, in a growing number of countries, these manufacturers are legislatively bound to fully transition to EVs by either 2030 or 2035 (depending on the jurisdiction). So unless you believe that for whatever reason automakers will not be able to figure out how to build EVs, the tipping point is going to come sooner or later. The exact date really doesn't matter.