Jason

President Obama signed the $106 billion war-spending bill into law Friday, but not without taking a page from his predecessor and ignoring a few elements in the legislation.

Obama included a five-paragraph signing statement with the bill, including a final paragraph that outlined his objections to at least four areas of the bill.

President George W. Bush was heavily criticized for his use of signing statements, declaring he'd ignore some elements of legislation by invoking presidential prerogative.

The Obama administration announced in the statement it would disregard provisions of the legislation that, among other things, would compel the Obama administration to pressure the World Bank to strengthen labor and environmental standards and require the Treasury department to report to Congress on the activities of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF).

"Provisions of this bill...would interfere with my constitutional authority to conduct foreign relations by directing the Executive to take certain positions in negotiations or discussions with international organizations and foreign governments, or by requiring consultation with the Congress prior to such negotiations or discussions," Obama said in a statement.

"I will not treat these provisions as limiting my ability to engage in foreign diplomacy or negotiations," he added.

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/...009-06-26.html

YouTube - Obama on Presidential Signing Statements

simpswr

I bet he wishes his party controlled congress??

yustr

I don't like it - as I feel it violates the intent of the constitution. I also don't like the fact that congress can put unrelated stuff into bills. That too goes against the intent.

In this case (as opposed to what W was fond of doing) Obama was objecting to suggestions and direction not portions of law. So slightly different but still not right.

As simpswr said, he should be able to get these things done offline.

Tumbleweed36

Yustr could not possibly be the flaming liberal he proclaims to be. He actually has some good thoughts and common sense going on here. Shoot, I don't even mind liberals when they use common sense (which most flaming liberals don't) in reviewing an issue.

yustr

Thanks Weed But I'm a leftist aren't I?

Actually I like to discribe myself as a "Rational Radical".

Some things just need to be done! For example (a bad one admittedly) back in the 1970's there was a move to switch the US over to metric measures like the rest of the world. But instead of saying "Effective Jan 1 1977 international units are the official units of the US." (in a year or two miles and pounds would have been all but forgotten) we compromised and put both on stuff. Now, even 30 years later, we're still using these goofy measures.

Some people only see the radical. I like to think there's a bit of pragmatism inherent in the rational part too.

simpswr

"Rational Radical" . . has a nice ring to it . . kinda like "Compasionate Conservative"

bry623

I was going to say something about yustr's reply, but I won't touch it with a 3.048 meter pole.