RE: Rent-Seeking and Wealth Destruction
Government is not part of the economy by definition. There are two ways to gains wealth: Production and plunder. The former is the economic means of production and voluntary exchange. The latter is aggression against those who use the economic means, and includes the government. Plunder is the political means.
We are not advocating "trickle-down economics" or "austerity." We are advocating individual liberty and respect for just property rights. Those political schemes have nothing to do with the free market, and cannot fix the root problems of economic interventionism.
War does not create wealth. War is the biggest example of rent-seeking destruction known to mankind. Resources are diverted from serving the economy and into the most overt-possible destruction of wealth. Are you unfamiliar with the Broken Window Fallacy?