Indeed, always ready to negotiate treaties but rarely prepared to sign – and even less likely to ratify – them, the US remains absent from such key global agreements as the Kyoto Protocol, the Mine Ban Treaty, and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Its inspired creativity and support in building formal institutions like the United Nations and World Bank has given way to a predilection for weak, informal, and ad hoc groupings, such as the various G-somethings and “coalitions of the willing.”