Barack Obama is not a man of The Gut, and it is driving official

Hear, O children of the Republic, the words of Charlie Pierce, who declared: “Barack Obama is not a man of The Gut, and it is driving official Washington crazy. This is a good thing, because resisting The Gut is what the Constitution is all about, especially in its war powers, which this president is conspicuously contemplative about exercising, at least in every context except launching drones.” In this saying, Pierce sets before us a tension as old as nations: the pull between impulse and restraint, between instinct and reflection, between the cry of the crowd and the measured hand of law.

What is The Gut of which he speaks? It is the instinct of leaders and nations to act rashly, to be driven by anger, fear, or the desire for glory. It is the impulse to wage war at the first provocation, to abandon deliberation in favor of spectacle and power. In America’s history, there has often been praise for leaders who act with the swiftness of instinct rather than the patience of contemplation. Yet the framers of the Constitution feared precisely this, and so they bound the power to declare war not to one man, but to the people’s representatives in Congress. For they knew that unchecked Gut would lead to endless blood.

Pierce finds in Barack Obama a different kind of leader—one who resists the call of Gut, who measures, who hesitates, who contemplates. This drove the courtiers of Washington, ever hungry for action and spectacle, to frustration. They desired war cries; he offered deliberation. They longed for impulse; he leaned on restraint. In this, Pierce reminds us that the Constitution was crafted to resist the passions of the moment, to ensure that decisions of war and peace come not from instinct alone, but from careful thought.

Yet Pierce is not blind to irony. He acknowledges that while Obama resisted the instinct to hurl armies into battle recklessly, he embraced the cold, distant power of drones—weapons that could strike without declaration, without sacrifice from those who launched them. In this, the president embodied both the virtue of resisting Gut and the danger of circumventing the very deliberation the Constitution requires. The drones, silent and swift, became the emblem of a modern contradiction: war waged cautiously in thought, yet relentlessly in practice.

History shows us similar contrasts. Consider Abraham Lincoln, who was deeply contemplative in his use of war powers, agonizing over every decision that might cost lives. Yet once he resolved that the Union must be preserved, he wielded his power with unyielding force. Contrast him with rulers like Kaiser Wilhelm II, who acted rashly in 1914, allowing Gut and pride to push Europe into the abyss of the First World War. One shows the power of deliberation; the other, the ruin of impulse.

The lesson here, O children, is clear: do not trust the Gut to guide matters of life and death. For instinct may serve in the hunt or the market, but in war it is a beast that devours nations. Trust instead in deliberation, in restraint, in the wisdom that weighs consequences and honors law. The Constitution itself was built to protect us from our own Gut, to slow the rush of passion so that justice and prudence might prevail.

Therefore, learn from Pierce’s reflection. In your own life, when the Gut demands immediate action—whether in anger, fear, or pride—pause, contemplate, and let reason temper your fire. For once loosed, rash action cannot be recalled, just as war, once begun, consumes all. Resist the Gut, honor the law, and let deliberation be your shield—this is the path of wisdom, the path that guards both nations and souls.