In light of this post at Washington Monthly, where Steve Benen discusses some poll results which show that Americans generally don’t want spending cuts.

The problem, of course, is that much of the public tends to approve of spending cuts in the abstract — and only in the abstract.

Prior to the State of the Union address, a majority of Americans said they favor cutting U.S. foreign aid, but more than 6 in 10 opposed cuts to education, Social Security, and Medicare. Smaller majorities objected to cutting programs for the poor, national defense, homeland security, aid to farmers, and funding for the arts and sciences.

[snip]

There are some partisan differences, not surprisingly, but Gallup also found that even most self-identified Republican voters also opposed cuts to farmers, domestic security, defense, combating poverty, Medicare, education, and Social Security.

As for foreign aid — the only area of the budget both Democrats and Republicans are willing to cut — it’s worth emphasizing that most Americans vastly overstate how much we currently spend in this area. Recent research from the Program on International Policy Attitudes found that the public thinks roughly 25% of the budget goes to foreign aid, while the truth is about 1%.

My question is, “Why do Americans think the Federal government gives away 25 percent of the money in the budget, and why do they think it gives it to foreign governments?” I’ve rarely heard any politician railing against USAID, the agency through which most foreign aid is funneled, so it’s not like the public is constantly being lied to, unlike other tropes we keep hearing (“Job-Killing Health Care,” “Failed Stimulus,” for example).
So where does this misconception come from?