The Decider has now signed another law and he also added a signing "statement". The US decided to sell India some nuclear technology, pretty much against the NPT. Now the commander in chief changed the whole thing:
Hours after signing an agreement yesterday on cooperation with India on civilian nuclear technology, President George W. Bush issued a "signing statement" insisting that the executive branch was not bound by terms of the agreement approved by the House of Representatives and Senate
WTF?
More after the flip
George W. Bush apparently has really lost his mind, this time he has changed the deal and he is just bonkers.
RawStory (yeah, i know, i know)
This is what he added to the law:
First, President Bush took particular exception to a section declaring the policies of the United States, noting that his "approval of the Act does not constitute my adoption of the statements of policy as U.S. foreign policy." The statements of policy included opposition to nuclear weapons production by all non-nuclear weapons states, as well as promoting India's commitments to control the proliferation of nuclear fuel cycle technology, cooperate in preventing Iran's development of nuclear weapons, and limit expansion of existing nuclear arsenals in South Asia.
Next, President Bush said that a control placed by Congress on transfers to India of items that would run afoul of Nuclear Suppliers Group guidelines "unconstitutionally delegated legislative power to an international body," and he therefore considered the section "advisory" in nature.
So, the United states is not trustworthy? Founding fathers @ 5000rpm..
Then, the president declared that 8 sections of the bill in total had to be construed "in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to protect and control information that could impair foreign relations, national security, the deliberative processes of the Executive, or the performance of the Executive's constitutional duties."
Now, for some reason the Indian Prime minister was aware of this:
In a seeming echo of Bush's statement, Reuters reported India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as responding to domestic critics of the agreement that "India would not be bound by 'extraneous' conditions attached to the deal when it was passed by the U.S. Congress this month, rejecting efforts to constrain New Delhi's policy towards Iran or its own nuclear weapons programme."
Did the US President fool the congress? Was Singh aware of his bullshit game? I have no evidence, so maybe he did not tell Singh.
But how is he allowed to do this? He first makes a deal with the congress and then undermines it? Doesn't this show that he can not be trusted?
Well, another Christmas present!
EDIT: for some legal discussion, here(or scroll down)