Yes, it's quite an unfortunate terminological collision. American "liberals" tend to dismiss the power of the market. This is quite a different attitude than that denoted by "liberal" in the context of economics.
I think it would be more correct to say that American liberals tend to dismiss the power of the market to produce the optimal result across all concerns not just GDP. Markets do a poor job at things like protecting the environment, and egalitarianism. Also, markets in practice tend to obstruct the sharing of information that is needed by theoretically ideal markets. Also, as capital accumulates free markets tend towards forming monopolies.
