By Elizabeth Pierdominice

A panel of distinguished authors discussed topics from their critical essays featured in the latest Jack Newfield book “American Monsters”.

Marc Jacobson, co-editor of “American Monsters”, said “An eye and an ear for an eye” is the motto behind Newfield’s journalism.

Newfield has a no-holds-barred approach to journalism in general, and to “American Monsters” in particular.

The intent of Tuesday’s lecture was to allow Newfield to introduce his new novel and discuss it with the audience. However, Newfield was not able to attend the lecture for medical reasons.

Despite Newfield’s absence, students and adults, both familiar and unfamiliar with Newfield’s works, filled the Cultural Center Theater on Tuesday, leaving few empty seats.

Students who read Newfield’s previous book “American Rebels”, launched the lecture with a tribute to Newfield’s influence in modern muckraking journalism.

Newfield and Jacobson categorized the book’s profiles in the style of Dante’s Inferno, with titles like “The Ninth CircleWorst of the Worst” and “Purgatory- Either Side of the Flipped Coin.”

In regard to the profiles John Turchiano said, “They are American Monsters who have become very wealthy for being hypocrites.”

Among the list of monsters are Andrew Jackson, Jonathan Edwards, Henry Ford and Walt Disney.

“America is a great quilt,” Jacobson said. “Without these people, I don’t think it would have come out quite the same.”

Turchiano discussed his essay on William J. Bennett.

“Someone once said that democracy is three wolves and a sheep, voting on what to eat for dinner,” Turchiano said. “Bill Bennett would be a fox because he is sly.”

Turchiano criticized Bennett’s term as Ronald Reagan’s education secretary and former President Bush’s drug czar, along with his gambling habit.

Hypocrisy, aside from corruption and deceit, is a common theme in “American Monsters”.

Jim Callaghan, another contributor to the book, engaged the audience by revealing the ironic tendencies of Henry Ford’s passions. On one hand, Ford championed for women’s rights and prohibited discrimination of black workers in his factories. On the other, Ford exuded anti-Semitic propaganda in news publications and produced trucks for Nazi Germany.

“He used the power of the media to spread his filth around the world,” Callaghan said.

Essayists featured in Jack Newfield´s new book American Monsters, about the very wealthy, hypocritical figures in the U.S. (Elizabeth Pierdominice/The Chronicle)