I think there's a difference between agreeing to hold the manufacturer harmless for anything that happens and accepting basic liability for purchasing the car and putting it on the road.

I guess jedberg's idea is that there needs to be a place for the buck to start, as it were, wherever it might end up. Currently that is the driver. However, I don't see why it couldn't start with the manufacturer. They could always try to shift blame to the owner if they were misusing it somehow or interfering with its correct operation.