A free market is one that is protected. Unfortunately nothing in the USA is protected. Our borders, our jobs, our votes. Those in control only care about themselves.
Socialism is an incredibly broad term in practice, a typical sound bite dictionary definition hints at this:
a political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.
So .. community as a whole, not just workers, and not even ownership is required, regulated for the general benefit (minimising polution, requiring power operators to deliver in 99.9% of weather conditions with a fixed cost ceiling) of the commons counts.
> Socialism means worker ownership of the means of production
Isn't that trending towards a definition of communism? Socialism could mean a lot of different things; economic protectionism is a market inefficiency designed to champion things like jobs over corporate profits, and was a policy choice made by some socialist governments in the latter 20th century.
Me and many others are cool with socialism. Are you?