'The first clean sheet airliner to be flown in any category. electric or not, in the US in the last 18 years'
This is the statement that matters and why I think electric is a huge deal. We can't get new designs into the air. It costs too much and takes too long. Electric has the potential to bring the design cycle back to something reasonable. Electric engines, and the supporting systems around them, are just so much simpler so there is so much less to certify. Once we really start designing for electric, and iterating on those designs, I think we will start seeing massive gains very rapidly.
First time I saw an electric plane with the cowling off was something like this:
https://www.wired.com/story/magnix-electric-plane-motor/
So much simpler.
The 737-Max is only not a clean-sheet only because the selling point is pilots don't need to retrain, which is a competitive advantage when selling to airlines.