(Detailed Review) Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right

MetaEconGary
Jan 19
5 min read

Updated: 6 days ago

This Blog Post applies Metaeconomics and Dual Interest Theory (DIT) to the question of whether the content of the shared other-interest touted by the MAGA New Right has legitimate empirical credentials, or, is it merely ideological and theological platitude? Read on, and, what think?

Field (2025) has a background (BA, MA and PhD) in political science, political theory and public law. The book adds new, contemporary, empirical insight into the deeper foundations of the MAGA New Right. Field both reveals the claims of the New Right and critiques said claims. And, while said New Right often seems to be a chaotic, shallow movement, Field clarifies that parts of it have evolved out of serious and systematic inquiry based in at least some intellectual and academic roots. Also, while it started to emerge in the US especially in about 2015-2016 as a faction, in many ways it is becoming a political party reflecting roots distinctly different from the Republican Party to which it has laid claim. Unfortunately, all said roots coalesce onto the same road of anti-democracy, too often with a neofascist tone, in frame and action.

As Field makes clear, the unfounded belief that the democracy must be replaced with some form of autocracy as in an Authoritarian (perhaps even Christian, again, often with neofascist undertones) Nationalism is lacking in empirical credibility. It is lacking in what has been learned about the best political system, lacking in the serious and systematic inquiry leading to the true empirical foundation of written and experienced political history.

To help understand what is going on, Field (2025), in addition to using written source material (books, journals, reports from right wing think tanks and other right wing organizations), also investigates the regular conversations --- the talk, talk, talk --- among individuals in the MAGA New Right. Field goes back to around the 2015-2016 period, but especially points to the 2020-2024 period. The book details many observations, and quotes from presenters and others in attendance at meetings and conferences. So, the book is quite empirical with the details represented in dates, names, and the content of conversation, as well as that found from wide and deep reading and study of the books and other documents underlying New Right claims.

Review is Framed by Dual Interest Theory

The Review is framed by DIT (Dual Interest Theory) in Metaeconomics. DIT brings the empathy-based ethic into view. The ethic --- and the moral components of it --- is key. The review will often refer to the analytical frame of DIT as represented in Figure 1 and Figure 2. DIT especially focuses attention on the content of the shared other-interest on road 0M, which holds the shared ethic among the MAGA New Right --- a kind of dark empathy-based ethic which tends to the immoral represented in the shared interest among the “us, the loyalists, the favored ones” to anti-democracy. And, because DIT rests on a solid empirical foundation coming out of science & humanities, the analysis here will be paying special attention to whether the empirical content of the shared other-interest held by the New Right is indeed credible. DIT puts attention to the shared other-interest, the ethic (see the Project of Metaeconomics), that works best, as in the American Ethic that had been in play since the 1787 Constitution framed the process for finding and reflecting it, and, is now under assault by the MAGA New Right.

Looking for Cargo-Cult Science

Clarifying here: DIT is not based in a cargo-cult science (make-believe), but rather rests on a solid empirical foundation based in science & humanities (click here for more on cargo-cult science). So, it is especially suitable to examining the underlying premises of the MAGA New Right, in a search for credibility. A DIT framed search especially pays attention to the extent to which truth is represented, and, is especially sensitive in the search for lies. Even if noble lies, such frames point to something other than credentialed claims. Said somewhat differently, DIT focuses on finding any cargo-cult (make-believe) claims, which are often characterized by disregard for the truth (not acknowledging facts even exist) and/or by lies. Said lies, noble or otherwise, acknowledge fact but the liar refuses to act on it.

The book starts with a Preface followed by 13-chapters, for a total of 406 pp. the Review here in the Blog is done chapter by chapter, for a total of about 45-50 pages. A shorter version will also be published, including a very short version in The Meteeconomic Order Substack, so, stay tuned.

Preface

Field, who at the time was a graduate student intrigued with Straussian political philosophy, frames the book with an experience while attending a dinner in 2010. It was sponsored by a conservative educational organization devoted to exploring American history, especially focused on the founding, which is a focus of Straussian philosophy. The crudeness and utter lack of any capacity for empathy-with the former first lady Michael Obama by one of the conservative attendees seated next to Field (go read the book; the comment is appalling in such a setting), stirred Field to question why Field was interacting with such people. The story starts here.

As Field says it: “ ‘What a total asshole.’ And then I asked myself: ‘What on earth am I doing here?’ It was the beginning of the long, slow process of extricating myself from the world of conservative intellectualism.” Field goes on to point out the timing was good, as the book is about what happened next in what came to be called the MAGA New Right, especially during the period of 2016-2024. Field clarifies that some of the basic framing was around in the Conservative frame from years past, but it really took on a more extreme tone.

Framing

Field (2025) uses “a play called Agamemnon, which is part of the Oresteia trilogy, the only complete set of tragedies that have been preserved from the ancient world. The plays are also a marvel of classical humanism and have inspired poets and artists all over the world for many generations ... Taken together, the Oresteia plays dramatize a historical shift in Athenian society and consciousness. The move is away from a primitive justice system of retributive blood vengeance (framed as feminine and irrational, and personified by Clytemnestra and the chorus of Furies), and toward a more complex form of democratic constitutionalism that elevates political bonds over tribal ones and celebrates equal dignity before the law (this is presented as masculine and rational). Aeschylus puts the sobering heartbreak of political reality onstage, and then, over the course of three plays, tentatively considers the possibility of reconciliation, and maybe even of progress. The reforms are liberal in the highest sense, meant to enlarge the commonweal, protect individual citizens, and prepare the way for peace.”

MAGA New Right as the Furies

The Furies are the angry people (mainly white men) in the MAGA New Right, some even favoring violent revenge. The Furies are all about “a reversion to particularism, tribalism, and closed-mindedness … entirely comfortable with illiberal forms of politics that stamp on individual rights and instead embrace raw exertions of majoritarian (or, if necessary, minoritarian) power (Field 2025, pp. 122-123).” The hope at the end of the book is that the Furies can be soothed, tempered, toned down such that the American Democracy can continue on the path started with 1787 Constitution. So, hang on, here we go.

Again, as noted, the Review is done by Chapter. Go back to the overall Blog page and choose your next Chapter to consider. It will be fun, and, we will all learn something... please add your Comment to each Chapter Review, and I will try to respond in a reasoned manner.