The sizes of the Reagan/Bushes' governements disagree with that. I realize that these kind of major paradigm shifts can be very dificult to swallow following so many years of having something else ingrained into our minds. But the facts are the facts. You can't increase the size of the government vastly beyond the recent Democratic example and just pretend that the Dems are bigger just because that's how it was for a long time. Nation-building, Dept of Homeland Security, huge borrowing and debts, etc. The parties are trading philospophies or, at the very least, the Dems are staying big but the GOP has long moved ahead of them.