High and Mighty: SUVs--The World's Most Dangerous Vehicles and How They Got That Way

High and Mighty: SUVs--The World's Most Dangerous Vehicles and How They Got That Way by Bradsher, Keith. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9781586481230.

The longtime Detroit bureau chief for The New York Times lays bare the dangers posed by the most popular type of American family car: the sport utility vehicle. SUVs have taken over Americas roads. Ad campaigns promote them as safer and "greener" than ordinary cars and easy to handle in bad weather. But very little about the SUVs image is accurate. They poorly protect occupants and inflict horrific damage in crashes, they guzzle gasoline, and they are hard to control. Keith Bradsher has been at the forefront in reporting the calamitous safety and environmental record of SUVs, including the notorious Ford-Firestone rollover controversy. In High and Mighty, he traces the checkered history of SUVs, showing how they came to be classified not as passenger cars but as light trucks, which are subject to less strict regulations on safety, gas mileage, and air pollution. He makes a powerful case that these vehicles are even worse than we suspect--for their occupants, for other motorists, for pedestrians and for the planet itself. In the tradition of Unsafe at Any Speed and Fast Food Nation, Bradshers book is a damning exposé of an industry that puts us all at risk, whether we recognize it or not.