Hey i'm only half serious on this, but there's no forum on that, more fanaticism than realism.
The sums of money aren’t, but could be if people were committed to it.
On the serious side:
What I'm really saying is that the USA doesn't have to do it all on its own with use of international funding.
BTW No one ever erected a statue to a critic

Warlords, yes; Dreamers, yes; People who championed the weak, yes; People who fought the establishment, yes; critics, no.
Plus I find it excessively cynical to not believe that we can strive for greatness.
We'll that opinion is based on summits like the G20, G8, Copenhagen, Kyoto and the UN whenever it deals with a failing country but we must accept fundamental difference is that most of those are on AGW. (Anthropogenic global warming)
Let’s compare Issues here:
AGW summits:
-Developing nations want to develop so they need cheap fuel which in the short term is Oil, Gas and Coal. Those are all CO2 intensive but for them to achieve a standard of living they will have to use them.
-Developed countries have to grow to keep their populations satisfied and this is a long run problem; no one won an election for averting something that MAY happen in 30 years time.
- Developed countries don’t want their population paying quadruple for their energy bills
- Developed countries have massive welfare states: education, health, benefits and pensions they can’t afford to shell out for poorer countries.
-Developing nations are often potential enemies and rivals for economic future and transferring money.
-Some countries doubt the existence of AGW or the severity of it (can’t blame ‘em)
- And last but not least this is about getting the best deal for your own nation and getting everyone else to pay.
Failing or dangerous countries:
-Other countries have interests in those countries (China, the USA or Russia for eg)
-Other countries have interest in keeping certain states failing
-Invading them doesn’t work and is counter intuitive
-Sanctioning them harms the people not the dictator
-There are a lot of dictators that don’t want to be eventually invaded themselves
Now let us look at cohesive successes (not about making people happy or about whether you agree with them or not, just where politicians get on!):
NATO: contains 28 states, most invaded Afghanistan or aid operations there, Europe has a supreme commander, the North American nations have a supreme commander, Balkans interventions and the international security assistant force.
The EU: 27 states: a massive success with 16 members abandoning their native currency, For all of the control over its interest rates to be sent to the EU, The regional development programme, the common agricultural policy the single market, the channel tunnel, the Schengan agreement and the Human rights bill. If you want international co-operation look here, there are squabbles but things get done.
Concorde
The Euro fighter
Various Military developments
In space:
Brazilian space agency is extremely fond of co-operating with deals with the US, China, Russia and the Ukraine
The European space agency: pools the small investment of its states into greater achievements
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pr ... ace_AgencyThe Chinese and Russian joint space operations
Indo-Russian, European, Bulgarian, American space co operation (Chandrayaan-1, APPLE) with various others
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Spa ... ganizationEuro- American space operations (Hubble )
Euro-American-Canadian operations (the James Webb space telescope)
Israeli- American co-operation
Chinese space station programme with likely help from Iran, N Korea and Pakistan
And the big one the International space station: 100 billion Euros total cost estimate by the ESA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internatio ... ce_StationSUMMARY:
So not impossible to co operate, probably impossible in a way I stated originally (with political factors involved). But such an operation is fiscally feasible as opposed to politically.
I would be sceptical of emploring the stereotype that internatinal eforts come to nothing when it is likely that they do when they cost little politically.