Culture Briefs

Green cars I

“Don’t count on seeing superstar Cher, nor her ’Burlesque’ co-star Stanley Tucci, cruisin’ around in a Prius anytime soon. Unlike many of their Hollywood counterparts, these two aren’t buying into the hybrid-car hoopla.

” ’I researched all the hybrid stuff and it’s pretty much all bulls**t,’ Cher said when asked about her vehicle preferences. ’I was going to get a Mercedes diesel thing, but then thank God I found out there was no diesel places near us, so if there was a fire, I would not be able to get out.’ …

“Tucci also backed up Cher on her hybrid hesitancy: ’If the stuff that’s there actually worked, like the hybrids, which are questionable at best. There is this huge promotion and then you look at the gas mileage. … [I]t is not that different at all. It just makes people feel better.’”

- Hollie McKay, writing on “Cher Disses Hybrid Cars, Warming to ’Curly Bulbs,’” on Nov. 15 at the Fox news blog Pop Tarts

Green cars II

“It’s a tragedy of epic proportions. Neil Young’s 1959 Lincoln Continental Mark IV convertible, which he has spent the past few years converting into a multi-fuel turbine electric hybrid, has been severely damaged in a fire. Fresh from a trip to Las Vegas where it was presented to adoring crowds at SEMA, this 19.5-foot-long representative of classic American automotive statuary, dubbed the ’Lincvolt,’ was resting comfortably in a warehouse in San Carlos, CA when a fire suddenly erupted. Possibly from the trunk of the behemoth itself. …

“Apparently, the Lincoln has its own black box-like computer that is being sent to Perrone Robotics in an effort to pinpoint the precise cause of the malfunction. The structure, which is said to have suffered over $1 million in damages, was also home to much of the singer’s music equipment and memorabilia. Due to the extraordinary efforts of firefighters, most of that was saved.

“We can only hope that, if the Lincvolt is now bound for that final scrapyard in the sky, it will inspire a tune as great as the elegy to Young’s 1948 Buick Roadmaster hearse, Long May You Run.”

- Domenick Yoney, writing on “Neil Young’s Lincvolt severely damaged in warehouse fire,” on Nov. 15 at Autoblog Green

Green movie

“Like the late free-market environmentalist Julian Simon, whose theories launched his own journey away from alarmism, [Bjorn] Lomborg believes that human ingenuity is the key to planetary improvement. And now, in Ondi Timoner’s provocative new documentary, also called ’Cool It,’ Lomborg travels the world to make that case in a most persuasive way. …

“Lomborg credits ’An Inconvenient Truth,’ the Al Gore movie, with helping to raise awareness of global warming, although through often-dubious assertions. For example, the polar bear population, Lomborg says, has actually increased since the 1960s, and is now most endangered by Arctic hunters, who shoot between 300 and 500 of the animals every year. Gore’s prediction of a 20-foot rise in sea levels was wildly overwrought; but in any case, Lomborg observes, ’Sea levels in the last century rose one foot - did anyone notice?’ He also says that, while global warming is a serious concern, we should bear in mind that human beings manage to thrive both on the equator and at the frozen poles: ’People can adapt to climate, which is always changing.’

“Lomborg believes that the world climate summits held in Rio, Kyoto, and Copenhagen over the last 18 years have been futile, because no country - especially such rising powerhouses as China and India, just now emerging into prosperity - will agree to cold-cock its economy in order to join the wispy Western global-warming crusade. And he claims that since the $250 billion the European Union spends every year to combat warming will ultimately reduce temperatures by only one-tenth of one percent, that money would be better channeled into worldwide battles against malaria and AIDS - diseases that are killing people right now - and into funding new climate technology.”

- Kurt Loder, writing on “Some Really Inconvenient Truths,” on Nov. 11 at Reason