Actually, we environmentalists started calling it "Climate Change" way back in 1992 when I was still deeply involved in environmental issues. It had nothing to do with "covering our backs" but rather that while most areas would experience warmer temperatures, some would actually be colder. The change is not totally uniform.
I remember being at Elizabeth May's home for a conference where someone pointed out that cold waters from the north would actually make the Grand Banks area much colder. Which is actually something that the cod would thrive in. Actually, by pushing the North Atlantic Current south, it's possible that England's rain would be more snow than rain.
Also, as NASA points out (
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/fea...ther_name.html ) "global warming" is not inclusive of other climate issues such as precipitation changes. So "global warming" is only the trigger for "global climate change" which is a much bigger problem.