When you say "the government is composed of people like you," I imagine you are talking about the low to mid echelons of the civil service. That's right, but they don't set policy. Corporations work together with politicians and reliable upper-echelon civil servants to set US policy, and the media works together with them to prevent the use of democracy. It's impossible for a US citizen to believe anything else if they have but the most shallow awareness of even the foreign policy alone of the past 70 years.

It's universal knowledge; you will hear it whether you are talking to a conservative christian or a communist, although the particular culturally appropriate way of phrasing it will change. You will even hear it from comfortable urban professionals, although couched in a way that makes it look like they're not excessively upset about it.

I have heard a lot of opinions, some of them bonkers, but there is one I have never heard; I challenge you to find one single American who believes that Iraq was invaded due to popular demand.

> I have heard a lot of opinions, some of them bonkers, but there is one I have never heard; I challenge you to find one single American who believes that Iraq was invaded due to popular demand.

I seem to recall it being fairly popular among the public back when it was proposed and first carried out, because there was a pretty widespread belief that Saddam did still have WMDs, and that he was somehow linked to 9/11. Those were both wrong, and there were certainly people who were skeptical, but it did have somewhat popular support at the time.

Some popular support?

"Days before the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Maines told a London audience the band did not endorse the war and were "ashamed" of US President George W. Bush being from Texas. The remarks triggered boycotts in the US and backlash from fans." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicks)

That's overlooking the order of events - first the decision was made to invade Iraq, then the WMD claim was invented, then the public was convinced of the claim, and then Iraq was invaded. If you only consider the last two steps, then it would look like the second to last event was first. Sadly, public demand was a consequence, not a cause.

I don't know whether it was actually invented or was the result of poor intelligence and the Bush administration wanting it to be true. At any rate, the public largely bought into it at the time.

> It's universal knowledge; you will hear it whether you are talking to a conservative christian or a communist,

I wouldn't expect either to be part of the Overton window, and both to be rather unhappy with current society. As for upper civil servants, corporations and the media, one has to suppose their interests are all aligned, as opposed to being in disagreement over various matters. Sounds like something you'd hear conservative christian or communist say. Someone unhappy with the current form of government who supposes there is a grand conspiracy preventing their ideal conservative or communist society from being realized. Instead of a majority of people not wanting such a society.

Both have a narrative of the world as being controlled by dark forces brainwashing people, instead of it being a complex, emergent structure from a messy history with nobody in control.

The factions within the, as you put it, Overton window, share some interests and oppose each other on some other goals. All of the uncertainty in policy lies in wondering whether corporations, politicians or upper level civil servants will get their way in each conflict, sometimes none of them getting their way due to gridlock. Nobody is in control, but some people are in more control than others. As you put it, groups outside the "Overton window" are all dissatisfied - but the really revealing thing is that they make up almost all of the US population.

> Isn't it debilitating to live in a place suffused with this opinion? Does it become self-fulfilling?

One of the 2 major political parties in the USA has pushed this opinion for as long as I’ve been alive. They deny federal government any opportunity to improve then point at government as an example of why it doesn’t improve peoples’ lives.

I hope other still-functioning governments learn from the institutional failures of the USA in the 1970s and 1980s so as to avoid following the same path.