It’s mostly correct, but even before McDonnell Douglas in the early 90’s Boeing actually had repeat issues of 737 rudders reversing direction in flight, causing accidents. Their response was exactly the same as the MAX8 crashes, cover it up and blame the pilots. It even sounds to me like they tampered with evidence according to Admiral Cloudberg’s telling of it: https://imgur.com/a/5wcFx8M

Boeing, which had packed the valve for shipping, did not explain why it kept the spring and the end cap. It instead tried to steer the NTSB toward a conclusion that the crash was caused by a wind rotor

I certainly still agree things got MUCH worse after the merger though