Here's how the card reads:

President Chooses:

-1 Food

or

The President discards 2 Skill Cards, then the current player discards 3 skill cards.

My question:

If the President doesn't have 2 skill cards, or the current player doesn't have 3 skill cards, can you still choose the second option and just not discard the cards?

Yes.

[10char]

Normally you can choose an option even if you cannot fullfill its text.

The two exceptions to this is Rosilin's negative abillity, and certain crisis cards (I think there is only one, it asks you to give up a nuke).

That is good news. I have been a human every time so far, and we always get hosed by the water shortage / food shortage card because of the way we were playing it. I was Rosalyn for both games, and I had to avoid contributing to skill checks sometimes just to be prepared for these types of things.