GlobalPost’s “The Unraveler”: U.S. foreign aid is shrinking and Americans don’t care
Michael Moran, foreign affairs columnist for GlobalPost

“As the White House puts finishing touches on its budget plan for 2015, most of the attention is focusing on domestic issues. … but something’s absent from the national conversation: foreign aid. … Politically controversial and wildly misunderstood by the public, the money spent by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to fight hunger and disease abroad is at a low ebb — and ever likely to stay there. … Polls indicate public support for foreign aid near a historic low. Indeed, one recent poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that a majority of Americans believe the U.S. spends 28 percent of its annual budget on foreign aid. The truth (mathematical — you can look it up!) is that U.S. foreign aid spending represents less than one percent of U.S. government spending. And that’s not going to change this year no matter how noble the Millennium Challenge Goals might seem” (2/13).