It's more about how if the US had to follow the rules and principles of liberalism, it would be outcompeted. A good example of this was with Japan and technology in the 70s and 80s, in which the US had to break the rules of liberalism to maintain an advantage. The US would seethe at how the Japanese handed out subsidies to their own companies and rather use their own suppliers, claiming it was unfair, even though that's how pretty much all US industry operated post WW2. (This is before all industry was moved to China). Only the US is allowed to "cheat" the economic principles of liberalism. No one else can. So Reagan got export constraints passed on Japanese cars, the US government co operated with business to get a trade agreement passed to allow IBM and TI to sell semiconductors in Japan and share technology with them. This allowed the US to "steal" trade secrets from the Japanese companies that allowed for their advantage.