It's difficult, when assessing the guy, to separate what we don't
admire in him from information that he brought to public attention. WIth
reference to Unsafe At Any Speed, he was not lying in the assertions
about unpredictable Corvair handling, undersize tires and hostile
dashboards.
We can agree that there were indeed handling problems in the first
Corvairs, that's incontrovertible, and we can also agree (as he pointed
out) that they were exacerbated by incorrect tire pressures. VW,
Porsche, Renault and Mercedes all used similar basic rear suspension, and
all discarded it for better systems. Would Corvair have done so without
Nader's prodding? I believe that the answer is yes, though the improved
rear susp might not have been introduced as soon. We'll never know.
As to the undersize tires, I'm going to say that for any manufacturer
to knowingly send out a vehicle with tires unable to support its rated
weight is wrong. We should not fault Nader for pointing out something
that Detroit knew about yet deliberately chose to ignore. That may be
the bean-counting point of view that continues to bedevil Detroit
products to their detriment.
Dashboards, well what the heck, we all loved the chrome toggle
switches and the shiny engine-turned panelwork. We're all guilty of
liking them. What was prettier than the Studebaker dash panel. Few gave
any thought to secondary impacts. Kaiser-Fraser sought to avoid
them--remember the 'safety' pop-out windshield that would allow
passengers to launch out of the car?
When evaluating Nader, we need to try to separate the messenger from
the message.
And, as you alluded, a great part of Nader's effectiveness (for want
of better word) was the relative credibility given to him by the antics
of General Motors. After their deeds came to light, nobody was going to
believe GM even if they were right, which in most cases they were.
Bob
>
> Nader was (is) a liar, plain and simple. Road and Track magazine
> documented it. He falsified the engineering drawings used in his
> books,
> "air-brushed" out the standard factory safety parts. The damned
> fools at
> GM, instead of asking their own engineers if the book was accurate,
> set
> private spooks on Nader, to try to get something incriminating on
> him.
> Those assh*les must have been in training for Watergate, since they
> were
> so inept they got caught. Then Ralphie sued GM and won millions of
> dollars, which he then used to promulgate even more lies, making
> himself
> famous. I despise the sorry piece of sh*t.
>
> -Rock http://www.rocky-frisco.com
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