Bush’s so-called “signing statement” was issued last Monday as he signed into law a nearly $700 billion military spending bill approved by the Democratic-controlled US Senate a week earlier.

The legislation—the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008—included a provision declaring that no portion of the funds allocated for the military could be used “to establish any military installation or base for the purpose of providing for the permanent stationing of United States Armed Forces in Iraq” or to “exercise United States control of the oil resources of Iraq.”

Another provision would have set up a commission to investigate fraud by government contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. Also included in the legislation was language protecting whistleblowers working for government contractors and a requirement that US intelligence agencies respond promptly to congressional requests for documents.

In his signing statement, Bush singled out all of these provisions, writing that they “purport to impose requirements that could inhibit the President’s ability to carry out his constitutional obligations to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, to protect national security, to supervise the executive branch, and to execute his authority as Commander in Chief.”

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