Let's examine some notable American foreign military interventions since, say, WW1.
WW2: "France, Germany, Japan, most of the south pacific: here is your land back from oppressive governments, please setup functioning democracies and don't do this again. Rest of pacific: you're going to be destabilized and general fuckery will occur". That ain't empire building.
Korea: "We don't want communism, so we're going to fight it. But after you can have your country back, please setup a democracy (eventually), we'll even help you defend it." That ain't empire building.
Vietnam: See Korea
Central and South America: "We would rather have instability than Marxist/Communist regimes. Also stop trying to import coke into our country. Also fuck you Cuba." That ain't empire building.
Iraq and Afghanistan: "We need to project some power here, but afterwards we'll hand your country, could you guys setup democracies, and create nations. Fuck this isn't working." That ain't empire building.
There is a lot to complain about with American foreign policy and projection of power. But it is not in the DNA of the country to go conquer some land and make it theirs. The closest you could argue that this is the case with the US, is their projection of power to maintain the petro dollar and the USD as the reserve currency. Otherwise, one thing they understand is that it is beneficial to them for strategic foreign countries to be democratic. Democracies tend to not fight each other in wars and Americans tend to benefit from the economic expansion of foreign democracies.
(And yes, Kert was confused about the word anomalous.)