LO, I don't think the lifting fan has as much of an impact on the non-B variants as you seem to imply. It certainly affects the B however. I think it has more to do with the requirement to internally carry a mk84 bomb body as well as an AIM-120 in the same bay. The bay ends up almost the same height as that big ass engine. But I think your first paragraph is generally on point.
I won't argue about that individual's crankiness, and he certainly misses the mark on why transonic acceleration is important but what part of his cocktail napkin math is off the mark in this case?
As far as the impact of body shaping and net vs gross wing area, I suspect that might have had a hand in the reduced sustained G spec. In other words, I suspect that it has a corner velocity commensurate with its "460ft^2" wing area and more modern airfoils, but that inefficient body lift shape (to paraphrase your words) means it'll bleed energy like a big dog. Ironically, in some respects that sounds a lot like the MIG-21 just with a 9g vs 7g limit and delta wing induced drag at fault vs inefficient body lift.
As to Radar Game: I really meant to introduce that for the masses. In as much as most people don't realize LO design isn't as simple as "make the RCS as small as possible." It's certainly simplistic, but does help those who still thing stealth is about being invisible.
As far as burn through and J/S ratios, my point was that a Growler could standoff much further and still provide support to an F-35 than it could from an F-16 for example. As far as self defense jamming, an LO platform will have a shorter burn through range than a non LO platform. As to EW advancement, the US all but abandoned EW with the push to LO. I think it's starting to come back to the table. We're starting to realize LO is not the panacea we thought it would be, and I hope EW
I don't think the F-35 has sacrificed "much of the kinematics" at least relative to what we currently have unless you toss the F-22 into the comparison. It's certainly not a clean F-16, but I think it's probably on par with a legacy fighter that has a bunch of missiles on the rail and dumped it's bombs and tanks but kept that rails.
The issue I have with standoff weapons is the time of flight. Short standoff is one thing, but longer range cruise missile are a different ballgame. If you're trying to hit a target that can pack up and move in 10 minutes, a 20 minute TOF is a problem; and yes I made up both of those numbers.
As far as the idea that reduced RCS+jamming+standoff weapons+UCAVs would an acceptable compromise versus the gold plated whole hog; well that probably goes to what the individual country desires as far as strategic objectives and what constitutes acceptable losses.
To end, LO I appreciate a level headed discussion that doesn't include hand wringing and foaming at the mouth about how much of a smelly pile of dung the F-35 may or may not be.