Despite their rhetoric, many supporters of limited-government still embrace unchecked government power in one respect: war. A movement that opposes the leviathan state at home but empowers the government to centrally plan the world muddles its message and compromises its principles.

For many compelling reasons, conservatives and Republicans distrust the "nanny state." They argue that government intrusions and wealth redistribution programs harm the free market, curtail individual freedoms, and concentrate power in the hands of incompetent bureaucrats. Government, they often claim, cannot do anything right. They often invoke President Ronald Reagan's aphorism: "government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."