> so USAID made up almost 2% of all the US' federal discretionary spending!

So, tiny; a fraction of what we spend on much less useful things like the Iran war or huge gifts to ICE.

30 years of that level of USAID funding would only get us to a single one of those trillions in debt.

> The vacuum their exit has created is being rapidly filled by a wide mix of other interests.

Yeah, we don't really want China vacuuming up all of Africa. It was already looking like a growing problem before the USAID cuts (https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF11304).

> So in your calculus you need to account for deaths caused by USAID as well.

I mean, your one example cited didn't work and resulted in zero deaths. If we get to count that sort of thing, we'd have to start accounting for the soft power benefits of USAID (and those the CIA gets from the trade), too. Goodwill, intel, not having a bunch of polio infections come into the country via air, etc.

> Teach a man to fish and you feed him for life, give a man a fish a day and you now control that man because he's dependent upon you.

How does "deplete their fishing grounds (and other resources) for hundreds of years" figure into the analogy?