[aerohead]

1) Some automotive periodicals have written that urban grid-lock is one factor driving the transition away from manuals. My last trip through California, after DARKO taught me never to go back to California. Ever! From San Luis Obispo, to Orange, it was seven hours. I suspect that California leads the world in carbon emissions. Foreign civil engineers, interested in parking lot design, travel to California to observe 'freeways' as inspiration.
2) I didn't have to wait on Porsche going to automatics to take the clue in 1975, when I left the West Coast, never looking back. Hundreds of clutch depressions and engagements over a few miles will destroy any fondness for the efficiency potential of a manual.
3) Evidently, it's also cheaper, and more profitable to manufacture with an automatic, than a manual ( from Bob Lutz). He would know.
4) EPA CAFE certification is easier on a carmaker with an automatic, as the 'nut behind the wheel' is eliminated from the equation, computer doing all the 'thinking.'
5) Since when, would Universal Studios, owner of NBC, know anything about transmissions? It would be like, what does NBC know about climate change. NBC's Al Roker broadcasts a special from the Arctic, about the dangers of global warming, then two weeks later, he and his associates are hot-rodding a high-performance Ford Mustang through a cordoned off area of New York City, live, on Good Morning America.