There has been no net warming since1997 with CO2 up 8.5 %. The earth has been in a cooling trend since warming peaked in 2003.The IPCC in their SREX report recognised that they could no longer scaremonger on the basis of the trend and so in that report and in the forthcoming AR5 they have chosen to concentrate on "extreme" events to promote their scaremongering anti CO2 policy propaganda..Droughts are generally more common on a cooler and dryer not on a more humid wetter earth and in N America with the current cooling phase of the PDO droughts are likely to be more common for the next 20 - 30 years.On a cooling earth with the jet stream swinging more meridionally, climate is much more variable with blocking highs bringing extremes of cold and heat.
The core alarmists Hansen, Mann, McKibben and Romm and their female acolytes are simply following the IPCC script with their ever more hysterical predictions of future extreme disasters as the current earth obstinately refuses to warm up. Andy I detect that you are not entirely comfortable with these wild speculations - but cant quite bring yourself to admit that cooling is more likely than warming in the next 30 years.
