Obama And Signing Statements

Continuing a pattern of political doublespeak – trashing the policy of his predecessor while simultaneously signaling that he fully intends to maintain it – President Obama yesterday directed Attorney General Eric Holder to review George W. Bush’s signing statements before any of the President’s senior officials use the documents for guidance. Obama then said that he would employ his own version of the same policy – a policy criticized by his own party as a method of circumventing the law.

In his order, the President wrote that “constitutional signing statements should not be used to suggest that the president will disregard statutory requirements on the basis of policy disagreements.” But Obama adds that he reserves this privilege to address what he calls “constitutional concerns” in such legislation, and pledged that he would use restraint in writing his own signing statements. Ummhmm...

It appears to me that he’s adding judicial review to his job description.