Is that really what this is about? I feel the GDPR is a different thing, independent of the cookies popup being a browser standard or not. The article talks about altering the definition of "personal data". I don't see why you can't keep the same definition while requesting websites to follow a browser standard... so I feel these are different things.
Or are you implying that the EU doesn't get proposals to gut privacy/data protections? (regardless of whether they're accepted)
Enforcing the restriction through a browser web standard, instead of a popup susceptible to anti-patterns, is a good idea. Sure, you could configure your browser to say "yes to all", but you control the browser. You could also configure it to say "no to all" if that's what you want. It'd be the equivalent of a popup, just automated by you. It's the way I always thought the cookie permissions should have been done. The same way as when a website asks about permissions for notifications, or camera/mic access.
But I don't think this is what the article is talking about. They are not talking about using a web standard or anything like that, they are talking about how the very definition of "personal data" is being changed, and that does not look good.