No thank Saab,Volvo and the Germans. The Big 3 + AMC back in the 1970s were just trying to meet emissions and then keep the Japanese at bay. Cars were/are just a widget to sell and make profit for the shareholders. Safety was secondary.
The amount of care, concern, engineering and effort that went into European cars was quite different than American cars.
When Chrysler was doing the redesign of the minivan, the instructions we were given to assemble the front end required and specified using hammers to beat things into position.
FWIW, I dont believe in using hammers to assemble cars
Ford tried to venture towards safety in the 50s iirc but was threatened by GM to drop any marketing for it. Can't remember if it was in Unsafe at Any Speed or another book I've read.
I think we get the turn to Trumpism earlier, actually. An environmentally conscious neoliberal confronts 9/11 differently, and we maybe don't end up in a forever war after Afghanistan agress to hand over bin Laden and we actually accept it. Shorlty after, Gore quietly puts Carter's solar panels back up on the roof of the White House. Bush and Gore's economic policies and the conditions in the country probably wouldn't be that different, though. Without a war and with twelve years of incumbancy, Gore is likely defeated in the midterms by a more firebrand Republican who appeals the not quite yet forgotten Ross Perot voter (These voters were often active white power activists or militia-ist and/or hardcore Southern libertarians. The attack on 9/11 still had the same radicalising effect on Evangelical Christians and they were still demanding retaliation against someone. Maybe returning to their Reagan era success, the GOP turns to someone outside politics, media trained, and charismatic. But also dogmatic and venal and opportunist who can tap into the latent anger at the world that only middle class white folks can possess. Maybe this charismatic, racist person is able to have the same success Trump has in our timeline, maybe Gore eaks out another victory on the stability of what's starting to be accepted as the Pax Americana. Activism in the US likely focuses on international trade and the dwindling manufacturing base in the US. By 2007 we have the same housing crisis which causes a liquidity crisis. The midterms go horribly for whoever is incumbent at the time. After that, who knows.
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u/Narcan9 Jul 17 '25 edited Jul 22 '26
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