The difference is, until recently, nobody knew the statistics for self-driving cars and how often they disengaged (by the way, Tesla is doing horribly in this regard). The information for traffic deaths has been public for decades.

Again, my emphasis is on the point that Elon Musk is spinning the information to his advantage. He has no interest in bringing attention to the shortfalls of his technology, only to sell the public on his soon-to-be-level-4 Autopilot system. He is also wildly misleading the public as to the capabilities of his technology, but unless you work on self-driving cars you wouldn't know that.

Of course it's his job to do this, and any sane businessman would. Which is entirely my point - Elon Musk is a salesman first and foremost.