Charge dismissed in fake hero's case, Valor Act ruled unconstitutional

A federal judge in Denver has ruled the Stolen Valor Act is "facially unconstitutional" because it violates free speech and dismissed the criminal case against Rick Strandlof, a man who lied about being an Iraq war veteran.

"The Stolen Valor Act is declared to be facially unconstitutional as a content-based restriction on speech that does not serve a compelling government interest, and consequently that the Act is invalid as violative of the First Amendment," Blackburn wrote in his opinion.

Strandlof, 32, was charged with five misdemeanors related to violating the Stolen Valor Act - specifically, making false claims about receiving military decorations.

He posed as "Rick Duncan," a wounded Marine captain who received a Purple Heart and a Silver Star. Strandlof used that persona to found the Colorado Veterans Alliance and solicit funds for the organization.

the ACLU of Colorado and the Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties group, all filed briefs with Blackburn contesting the Stolen Valor Act.

The Stolen Valor Act prohibits people from falsely claiming they have been awarded military decorations and medals.

I unbagged two silver star winners to verify and sign that they had been prayed for prior to shipping their remains to their families. They had returned to an attack unaided to save the lives of Marines who’d been pinned down.

I was present when their stars were posthumously awarded.

You must understand the value that warriors place on these medals. Without understanding that you cannot understand their emotion around those who would lie about it.

Along with others, P-M, you were enraged at Kerry’s obviously false claims to have been part of a commando infiltatration of Laos/Cambodia. The Swift Boat warriors weren’t united because they disliked Kerry. They had long before been united by their common experience.

I deeply resent anyone lying about their record, their awards, and especially valor awards. Those are too precious for a civilian to understand.

Not defending the integrity of these awards would be the same for me as my being the one who ordered men to die in Somalia and then running away after blood had been spilled. You besmirch the real lives sacrificed by allowing imposters.

If necessary, I’d rewrite this law so that it does have teeth. I don’t consider it a first amendment issue at all. I consider it a confidence game issue.

How would you rewrite it? The judge is right - the facts seems to indicate that the idiot in question is a braggart and not much more than that. I liked the idea of the database for valor awards. Extending it to actual service is a problem. Some guys might not want their records available on the internet, which is understandable.

A civil action might be workable. It’s not criminal, so it escapes the restrictions on criminal actions. The biggest problems are standing and the civil penalty. Veterans’ organizations could provide someone with standing to sue for false claims about valor awards, but the penalties need to be appropriate or the courts will toss it again. Maybe forcing the guy to put his face on a few advertisements that admit he lied would work.

I deeply resent anyone lying about their record, their awards, and especially valor awards. Those are too precious for a civilian to understand.

As conservatives I think we really need to avoid the temptation of reacting to things that we resent by saying "there ought to be a law...."

Liberals always want to outlaw those things that offend them.

FWIW, I don't think there are enough of these cretans who want to pretend to be heroes when they are not to subtract from the valor of any man who ever earned a medal for valor. The honor belongs to them whether they ever got the medal or not. The medal represents that others have recognized that unique characteristic in that man.

At any rate, I don't think we need to go down the path of making it a federal crime to pretend to be someone you are not. If such action causes actual damage to another person, such as stealing his wallet or breaking his leg, then it is rightly prosecuted as a crime under existing and traditional laws of fraud and deceit.

I have a couple of more thoughts about this.

Does the federal government have the right to regulate the awards and certifications only it can offer? SVA is not about non-federal awards or certifications.

Does the award or certification have value in and of itself?

Does a non-recipient of an award or certification diminish legitimate awardees, the award itself, or the organization sponsoring the award by falsely claiming to have received the award?

What about the impact of fraudulent behavior not for personal gain but for the gain of another? If for example, Strandlof falsely claimed to have passed the Colorado Bar, and did pro-bono legal services, would that be wrong, or would that be free speech with no personal gain? What if those legal services did not require one to be a lawyer, and what if they were done accurately? Is that fraud? No money was made, and a proper service rendered.

Strandlof did leverage false claims to gain advantage in lobbying local governments, raising money for organizations, and promoting and raising money for politicians.

What if I claimed to have won the ACLU's Roger N. Baldwin Medal of Liberty, and leveraged that lie to lobby organizations, promote politicians, or raise money for causes? What if I leveraged such a lie to create my own organization?

Maybe all of this falls outside the purview of the SVA, but it gives lie to the concept that claims about awards or certifications and leveraging those false claims to promote causes or raise money for others is not for gain.

To me, there is a huge difference to claim to have "served in Iraq" and to claim the United States Marine Corps awarded you the Silver Star. In that latter case, you are not lying about yourself, you are lying about many others.

“That said, it seems to me that any rational, honest person would immediately see that no law that denies us our God-given right to self-protection could possibly be deemed “duly enacted.”

What does “duly enacted” mean to you then, if not a law passed by through proper legislative channels? Is every law that you disagree with not “duly enacted”?

I’m with you on the Second Amendment. I’m just saying that the courts’ job is to strike down every law that conflicts with the constitution of the U.S. Obviously, you are sometimes in agreement with the right and duty of the courts to do so, so long as you agree with the outcome.

And by the way, the question before the Court in the Chicago handgun case was not whether the Second amendment was null and void, but whether its protections should be extended to the states through the mechanism of the 14th Amendment, because the Supreme Court has always found that the original intent of the Founders was that the Bill of Rights only applied to the actions of the federal government.

“Is every law that you disagree with not “duly enacted…you are sometimes in agreement with the right and duty of the courts to do so, so long as you agree with the outcome.”

Despicable. It is absolutely despicable that a person should engage in that sort of behavior on Free Republic. Even loathsome leftist degenerates who use that ploy understand that it is entirely without merit. Leftists do it, of course, to slander and deny their target the opportunity to present his arguments. Why are you doing it?

Any intelligent, honest, sane person would look first for legitimate reasons that another intelligent, honest, sane person might agree with one case and not the other, before accusing the other fellow of slack-jawed stupidity, bigotry, inconsistency, and just general, all-around great-googly-mooglyism, which is the clear, undeniable implication of your remarks, quoted above.

Or perhaps it is that you cannot imagine that a lower court, much less the Supreme Court, could be wrong, or—dare I say it—dishonest?

Wrack my brain as I might, I cannot come up with any reasons, other than those two, that you might say a thing like that. So, which is it—a slanderous gambit intended to put me on the defensive and keep the discussion away from the actual issues, or an indication that you cannot imagine that a court could be wrong or dishonest?

“And by the way, the question before the Court in the Chicago handgun case was not whether the Second amendment was null and void”

Is it that you didn’t understand a word I said, or that you are trying to irritate?

“but whether its protections should be extended to the states through the mechanism of the 14th Amendment, because the Supreme Court has always found that the original intent of the Founders was that the Bill of Rights only applied to the actions of the federal government.”

The Bill of Rights is not the source of the rights enumerated therein. Those rights come from God, and whether the Bill of Rights applies to the states or not, God does. A law that violates the rights that are our birthright as children of God is invalid before a far higher court than any constituted by man, which means that it is without force. “Lex mala, lex nulla,” as Aquinas said.

You cannot find a single Founding Father who did not agree with that, and who did not put his life, his property, and his sacred honor on the line to make it a reality.

As this has been true for as long as there have been human beings, it was true even before the 14th Amendment, which only served to make a portion of that truth explicit: “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Does a law that denies citizens their God-given right to self-defense abridge their privileges or immunities? You bet your bippy it does, scooter.

Does a law that forbids people to kill pre-born babies abridge their privileges or immunities? If you think it does, you’re on the wrong site.

Therefore, the one law is not constitutional and should be struck down, while the second is constitutional, and a judge or justice betrays humanity and the United States when she strikes it down.

Of course, if you don’t want to deal with such arguments, you can continue to assert the lie that I only agree with the courts “when (I) support the outcome.”

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