ambiguity

I feel like the SFC is overly fixated on one particular phrase, which is in fact only connected by an “and/or”, ie according to the ruling, the license doesn’t require the ability to reinstall in a manner that even preserves the original features of the program, regardless of whether the whole thing works or not.
As a matter of fact, I would go further, I don’t see where the GPLv2 requires the ability to reinstall at all. It requires the provision of the scripts that were used for installation, it does not require that the end user be able to actually use those scripts to install the software. It doesn’t impose any conditions on installation at all, and it has explicit language stating it only covers copying, distribution and modification; and installation doesn’t come under those. It’s not something that’s obvious from the installation script requirement, the license shouldn’t preclude the case that the hardware doesn’t even have the ability to reinstall software after manufacturing, for eg.
The right to mess with the device that you bought might have been in the back of someone’s mind when they came up with the idea of free software, but it isn’t part of what the license itself says are its intentions: “… the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software…” This makes no mention of making the hardware that the software runs on in any way free. You can change the software, but if you want to run the changed software, there’s no guarantee that you will be able to do it on the hardware, if any, that was packaged with the software.