Walt Whitman and David Brooks

Now it is finally the time to catch up all my posts for last week- the first week is always a struggle: New schedules, classes, professors, and classmates. Luckily Amcon is still Amcon from last semester, and I like it.

We read the famous Democratic Vistas from Walt Whitman and an essay by David Brooks flattering everything Whitman had said last Wednesday. In class we discussed we debated about whether, according to Brooks, Democratic Vistas should be considered as the most important political sermon about democracy in America. I did not have the courage to sit in one those chairs but I did have an opinion arguing against Brooks. Just like some of our classmates pointed out in class, I haven't read enough political sermons to make the assumption, but I believe that I have somewhat read, hear and seen enough to form a solid point. Despite the inconsistent and confusing writing style he has, I agree with Whitman on some of the points he has suggested, for example how democracy should rise from the characteristics of cultures, and individualism should be the basics of all democracy. But when I was reading Whitman, I also found him really hard to understand and self-contradicting. Firstly, the part where he was talking about how he wants to become "the American poet" who brings out the importance of literature. It seems that he, the individual, has the ego to become the authority of all the nation's literature, which to his extend, the culture as well. Isn't the so called authority contracting to democracy that men are all equal and no one should command/rule over other people?
Secondly, Whitman recognizes that he is contradicting himself, and Brooks notices it too. I still find it extremely hard to grasp why he keeps criticizing the Americans and praising them at the same time. Maybe he is arguing both the good side and bad side of human nature, and thus saying that democracy is both good and bad because humans are behind the idea? I really don't know.