This makes zero sense. It's like saying giving the owner a steering wheel they can use to crash their car into a pedestrian is going to be a liability for the manufacturer when the obvious happens and it's used as a murder weapon.

That's ridiculous, the person who is liable for the murder is the murder, not the car company. It's a transparent excuse because they want to force people to have their car repaired at the dealership. Nobody's buying it.

There is a legitimate use for a steering wheel. The ability to remotely command full throttle on a car is useful for what?

It's a computer. There are many legitimate reasons for the computer to control the throttle, from implementing a top speed governor when the car is in the hands of your children, to tuning the engine for unusual environmental conditions, to interoperating with aftermarket vehicle modifications.

"Remotely" is just how the code gets installed. But installing updates for any of those features over the air is perfectly fine when authorized by the owner of the vehicle.