Dorcas Speer Interviews Ralph Nader (WOI News Clip 417)

Progress is that there's now a federal law that requires the government to set safety standards for all new vehicles and by 1969 for used vehicles as well as well as a number of other areas in traffic safety which will receive greater attention and money from the federal government as a great deal of attention has been given I know and a great deal of time you have given toward the design of the car and I wonder though how much have you been concerned with the individuals driving the car yes well my book was on the motor vehicle aspect of traffic safety obviously drivers have a part to play as well I think it's important however to note that we can't put the majority of our emphasis only on the driver because the driver is much more difficult to control than to design the vehicle and that although we must continue to improve our driving performance and better highways as the vehicle is the single most controllable factor that will cut the causal chain between the contributing factor to the accident and the injury the best example I know of that is that when an accident occurs the only way people are killed or injured is the way they interact with the inside of the car sharp edge is an instrument panel the door pops open on them they're thrown out the steering column ramrods back into the driver and so forth and so once accidents do occur as they will unfortunately again and again the vehicles the only thing that can save the people in the car from being injured or killed in the accident so the vehicle is a wonderful second line of defense if it is designed to be crash worthy enough to protect people in collisions that are now not survive a little bit but certainly should be if the manufacturers wanted them to be now should somebody take up the crusade however to do something about better educating our drivers well the law which was passed last year provides for large federal support for driver training programs in the 50 states I think our driver education programs are too much classroom oriented and not enough behind the wheel oriented I know in Iowa for example thirty hours are devoted to classroom education only six hours behind the wheel I think that recently has been changed to I believe twelve hours but even so the ratio is totally inadequate far more important to get them behind the wheel with adequate equipment and techniques so that they know how to behave in an emergency situation in his skin and other situations that will confront them and we have proper legislation that takes care of the the difficulties as human beings that we have with sight and some of these afflictions that make us not prime yes that again is a area which will receive greater emphasis that is people who have physical disabilities will be checked periodically particularly eyesight in fact everybody is going to be checked for eyesight every four years in order to determine whether they are still capable of driving a car adequate if they're not they're licensed unfortunate will have to be taken away from them what about reaction time reaction time is more difficult to measure and the problem of clear vision is something you can determine with some precision reaction time however is something which you can't particularly draw a line to as easily as you can envision but I'm sure they're gonna have to take that into account you can't be too strict you can't be too strict on this because if you are you will find yourself stripping half the drivers of their license and if you do that you'll find half our industry breaking down because nobody can reach them they're going to work well and of course reaction time even with the normal person a normal healthy person is going to vary from one hour to the next in many cases now reaction type for elderly drivers is quite important there's where you get a gradual deterioration until a certain point is reached whereas simply is totally inadequate reaction type so for older drivers this will be an important measurement of periodic driver's lisence driver testing now it is my understanding and I don't want to get us off this but as my understanding that you are also concerned now about our meat industry oh yeah so I think everybody should be concerned about the meat industry at least all people meat eat eat meat no no one particularly bothers you well roughly 25% of all meats processed in this country is processed within state boundaries and therefore it escapes federal inspection US department of Agriculture does not have the jurisdiction to go into these in-state plants and over the years there has been a series of of gross grossly unsanitary problems arising the use of 4d animals dead dying disease disabled animals unsanitary conditions in the plants and the use of federally banned chemical injections colouring agents preservatives to make future to meat more acceptable to the consumer six years ago congressman Neil Smith from Des Moines introduced a bill in the House to expand federal inspection service to include most of these plants now we have had hearings this year in the House level and there's a little question about that next year we will have a law passed that will lead toward the improvement of this extremely discomforting if not revolting situation and so that this would affect the rather than just affecting the interstate it should fact in fact affect the intrastate and interstate see much of the substandard meat the disease may find its way into processed meat products such as hot dogs Bologna and other similar products and unfortunately was the genius of modern chemistry the meat buyer can't even tell the difference it's colored preserves season everything is camouflaged well is this going to be something that they large meat packers cooperate well most meat large meat packers are federally inspected but even the largest ones have some plants operating within state boundaries that escape inspection and to have all the problems that occur with some of the smaller meat packers so it's not entirely a problem of the medium or smaller meat packers well but now their products cannot carry then if it is not packed I always not expected it cannot carry the seal and does not now carry the seal that's right but unfortunately some unscrupulous firms will fake the seal so that they deceive people into thinking they have the USDA seal but that is still the best the best cue for the meat buyer if he sees that USDA seal he can be sure that it's a federally inspected well now is he going to put his plant number on it if it is faked there are different versions no obviously he's not gonna identify plant number because many of these plants don't have plant numbers because they're not inspected but I mean the one that as you say it's the one that is the large packer that has the off not the off-brand but the other brand and that you can identify this many times by the stamp with the number now if it has this stamp and number on it it has been inspected yes generally speaking there are some clever deceptions of the label but generally speaking it has been inspected unfortunately the entire meat industry's opposing strengthening the law both large and small packers well this will be interesting to follow and at the same time I'm sure that everybody will be interested in your comments and unsafe at any speed which is your latest book isn't it. Thank you. this is Ralph Nader