Richard Seager plays his traditional role of scaring the crap out of Westerners:

What is permanent drought? It’s pretty much just like it sounds.

When I ask (with serious journalistic intonation, I might add) how long a permanent drought would last, he answers simply: “It would just become the new climate.” Duh.

(h/t Laura Paskus)

Here’s the current Texas drought map:

Seager and his colleagues, at Lamont-Doherty, are one of the best climate research groups I’ve worked with at presenting a lay-audience window into their work. They do ocean->drought modeling, and all their major papers get a web page explaining the work for the general public. The full kit is here.