The problem looks intractable to me but that is why "A team" engineers exist. I didn't think that they were going to get the tunneling machine that got stuck under Seattle working again, but they did. Whether or not the public ever trusts the plane and whether SouthWest and Boeing survive without a government bailout may be another question.
The overall problem is far more insidious than relying on a single sensor, and I think that is what they are running into. Moving the stabilizer seemed like an elegant solution but there are circumstances where moving it can get it stuck due to aerodynamic forces. This requires heroic efforts from the pilots to unstick it (whether or not that was a factor in either accident is being debated). Low cost airlines can't afford to hire hero pilots, and an alternative plane exists that does not require them (allegedly.)
What I don't understand is how the system met the requirement for a continuous pressure gradient on the stick (I'm probably phrasing that badly.) So you have constant pressure when pulling the jetliner up rapidly to avoid that drone in your path, which is great because you don't get a sudden light stick sensation that lets you pull up too far into stall, but now push down to get back to level flight. This is probably yet another stupid question, but with the stab trimmed down, aren't the stick forces pushing down going to be much lighter than they normally are? I haven't seen anything -- although I could have missed it -- that MCAS trims back up when the AOA decreases, that is supposed to be noticed and handled by the pilot. This may be a reasonable assumption, but remember this is the pilot who couldn't be trusted not to pull the plane into a stall!