Don’t confuse mantra with an actual free market.
What the politicians call free market isn’t.
Free market means the government doesn’t pick winners and losers.
Watch some Milton Friedman to understand what free market capitalism really is.
That basically was what my argument was alluding to, that it wasn’t a free market. It was a losing market that was providing growth only for our competitors. While at the same time destroying our markets. Only insanity would insist upon it continuing along the course it was on.