Although I, too, am disappointed by many of these "progressions," here are a few points I would like to make.
First, someone mentioned that the cr-v sells 2-1 compared to the rav4. But I think if you compared rav/highlander/4runner/land cruiser to cr-v/pilot, sales would be comparable. (Some might mention the Element, but this is a strange breed, and, besides, then you could point to the Scion xB anyway.) I think Toyota is trying to “compress†the line-up a bit.
Second, you won't see the highlander change much soon. The hybrid just became really available within the last 6 months or so. But I wouldn't be surprised if the non-hybrid disappears.
Which reminds me - I was really shocked that the RAV4 didn't become a hybrid. At least as an option. Maybe it’s a battery production problem. I know that battery production was a major factor with Prius supply/demand.
Which leads me to my third point - maybe the loss of the manual tranny in general is because the cars are all going hybrid/alternative.
I used to have a camera store. I remember when APS film & cameras came out. Everyone was all up in arms about how this new meduim would never replace 35mm, and how APS was for amateurs, and no serious photographer would ever be seen with it, and it was all just a stupid money-making scheme to sell more cameras and film! But the reality is that these smaller cameras and film were the precursors to digital. All the manufacturers knew that digital was the future, but the little CCD chips (the digital "eyes," so to speak) weren't good enough yet. So they basically created all new systems around the size of CCD's so that as soon as the CCD’s were good enough, the cameras would be ready to take them without starting from scratch. Well, no serious photographers ever did switch to APS. But digital is obviously doing OK!
So what I’m suggesting is that maybe the reason manual transmissions are disappearing is not so much because no one wants them - but the fact that the manufacturers are recognizing that this older technology just won’t fit as well into the highly computerized hybrid, electric, fuel cell, and/or “yet-to-be determined,†cars that they see themselves making in 10 years.
Todd