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As obnoxious as those lying POSs are, the court made the right call. Absent some actual fraud (which requires a material benefit from the lie), I don’t see any way this can be made illegal, any more than you can make it illegal for some barroom Lothario to tell the girls that he has a ten-inch schlong.

Too bad this came from the ninth. There was a similar one out of Colorado with the same result. The judges in both courts were all Bush, either father or son appointees. I agree with what you’re saying, absent any injury to other parties if we start letting government prosecute speech they will not stop with this law, they’ll move onto even more hurtful and despicable crimes, like criticizing them or their far left wing base.

Stolen Valor Act - In their words

“I’m a retired Marine of 25 years. I retired in the year 2001. Back in 1987, I was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. I got wounded many times by the same guy. I’m still around.”

Xavier Alvarez, at Three Valleys Water District board meeting in July 2007

“Whoever falsely represents himself or herself, verbally or in writing, to have been awarded any decoration or medal authorized by Congress for the Armed Forces of the United States, any of the service medals or badges awarded to the members of such forces, the ribbon, button, or rosette of any such badge, decoration, or medal, or any colorable imitation of such item shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than six months, or both.” (The prison term is extended to one year if it involves the Congressional Medal of Honor.)

Stolen Valor Act, passed in 2007

“Indeed if the (Stolen Valor) Act is constitutional under the analysis proffered by (dissenting) Judge Bybee, then there would be no constitutional bar to criminalizing lying about one’s height, weight, age or financial status on Match.com or Facebook, or falsely representing to one’s mother that one does not smoke, drink alcoholic beverages, is a virgin, or has not exceeded the speed limit while driving on the freeway. The sad fact is, most people lie about some aspects of their lives from time to time.”

Judge Milan D. Smith Jr., writing the majority opinion

“Public discourse requires that citizens are equally free to praise or to condemn their government and its officials, but I can see no value in false, self-aggrandizing statements by public servants. Indeed, the harm from public officials outright lying to the public on matters of public record should be obvious. If the Stolen Valor Act ‘chills’ false autobiographical claims by public officials such as Alvarez, our public discourse will not be the worse for the loss.”

Judge Jay S. Bybee, writing the dissenting opinion

“I am very disappointed to learn of the 9th Circuit decision on Stolen Valor, however I am confident that upon appeal to the Supreme Court, their misguided decision will be overturned. As long as I am in Congress, I will not give up the effort to protect their honor. These fake heroes use lies to claim underserved federal veterans benefits and defraud their communities into believing they are someone they are most certainly not for personal gain. I will continue to fight for the veterans of our country.”

Rep. John Salazar, D-Colorado, who introduced the Stolen Valor Act