you have no clue what you are talking about.
They ran stock Bridgestones, watch the first 40sec. of this Nissan Promo video and you can see them on the car.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGe_fyhQazg
also slick tires don't scream like that, it is the grooves in the tires that make the noise, slicks don't do that.
The Vette is the only car that still runs the transverse setup, the General just likes it that way, just like pushrod V8's. Also with the transverse leaf you can't change spring rates with out removing the whole suspension and it's hard to adjust ride height.
And the Pratt and Miller race cars "the C6-R you spoke of" got rid of the leaf springs and ran coilovers, so that tells you how good it is.