Stolen Valor

The test case was the introduction at his first public meeting of the Pamona, California, Three Valley Water District Board of newly-elected member Xavier Alvarez. He said, "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." He also stated that he played hockey for the Detroit Red Wings and that he once married a starlet from Mexico. Unfortunately, none of this was true. For all the record shows, his statements were but a pathetic attempt to gain respect that eluded him. He appealed his conviction under the Act, claiming that the Constitution allows people to lie.

The Ninth Circuit Court agreed with him, and so did the US Supreme Court. Lying may be abhorrent, abominable, appalling, bad, base, cheap, contemptible, cowardly, crooked, damnable, debased, degenerate, deplorable, depraved, despicable, detestable, dirty, disgraceful, disgusting, dishonest, dishonorable, disreputable, egregious, evil, foul, godless, hateful, ignoble, ignominious, immoral, improper, inexcusable, infamous, iniquitous, loathsome, low, mean, nasty, nefarious, objectionable, odious, offensive, outrageous, perverse, petty, plebeian, reprehensible, reprobate, repugnant, repulsive, revolting, rotten, scandalous, shameful, shifty, shocking, sinful, sordid, unconscionable, unethical, unforgivable, unprincipled, unsavory, unscrupulous, untrustworthy, unvirtuous, unworthy, vile, villainous, wanton, wicked, worthless and wrong, and in some cases, it may even be harmful. But in the United States, it is not intrinsically a crime. The First Amendment says you have a Constitutional right to be a liar if that's your thing.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority, observed, "The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true. This is the ordinary course in a free society." In a similar case in 1927, Whitney v. California, Justice Louis Brandeis wrote, "If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."

Christians know all about stolen valor. It is tough to be a Christian, and millions upon millions of Christians have endured death, even under unspeakable torture, in pursuit of their faith. Catholics, Anglicans and Orthodox honor thousands of these people as recognized saints, and celebrate their feast days. Halloween ("Holy Evening") is the day before the Feast of All Saints, including those unknown or forgotten. Saint Patrick's Day and Saint Valentine's Day are popular US holidays.

Most of us don't reach this celebrity status. We try to practice our faith "With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love." Unfortunately, among us are all sorts of people who call attention to themselves by claiming to be Christians, but they are no more Christians than Alvarez was a hero. They want the benefits of Christianity, but are unwilling to do what that takes. They say that they have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, but they don't believe what he taught, do what he commanded, or even know what many of those things are. They really don't seem to know much about him, Jesus himself warned us about them and told us what to look for. If we confuse them with real Christians, we have only ourselves to blame.

These people's basic problem is that don't act like they're very bright. It could be that they're uneducated, intellectually challenged, senile, spaced out on legal or illegal medication, or temporarily under a lot of psychological or emotional strain. Then again, maybe they're just plain stupid. They confuse folk tales with science, legends with history, and superstition with fact. Stupidity has always been a capital crime for our species, and sometimes you get convicted. There is no appeal from the decisions of Almighty God. That's how behavioral evolution works. These people don't seem to have gone through a lot of that, which is perhaps why they not only don't believe in it, but are opposed to other people learning about it as well.

Like Xavier Alvarez, these people will tell all sorts of lies, even in court under oath on a Bible before God, in a pathetic attempt to gain respect. They assert that an election that they lost fair and square was "stolen" (or is about to be), that "the media" is afraid to report what they boldly proclaim, or that they are privy to secret knowledge that no one else dares to reveal. They love imagined conspiracies about inconsequential matters, for example that the ACLU has filed a suit to end prayer from the military, or that Navy chaplains can no longer mention Jesus' name in prayer or "In God We Trust" is being taken off our money or that the President canceled the National Day of Prayer, all of which is a load of cow dung. You can sometimes see them claiming these things on TV, as well as singing, sobbing, cursing the United States, castigating other people and their religions, "gettin' healed" of imaginary afflictions, burning crosses and copies of the Koran, or terrorizing teenaged war widows at their hero husbands' funerals.

What you conspicuously do not see them doing is praying! They make speeches instead, not unlike the Pharisee in the Bible. Maybe they're afraid of approaching God. What did Jesus say about liars?

These people are very dangerous, because lies, even totally unbelievable whoppers, are directly opposed to the Truth, which will make you free. Just look at all the trouble the lie, "Ye shall not surely die" has caused! As Justice Kennedy noted, "The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true." but you will not hear these people invite you discuss things or to reply to them at all, much less with the truth. No, they tell you that the matter "is not open to discussion" or to "forward or delete," because they cannot stand "speech that is true." They like Stolen Valor! What they don't like is civil rights advocates, scientists, the Supreme Court, or anyone else who disagrees with them.

I try to avoid them, because they are generally unpleasant, and we have very little in common. I am absolutely never going to accept what passes for their "religion," and if there is something I might do that will force me to associate with them for all eternity, I'm going to try to avoid that as well. Nevertheless, they keep sending me mail and including me on their published email lists, which puts me in the position of allowing evil to succeed by doing nothing, which is a sin, or at least trying to combat falsehood with "speech that is true." Fortunately, "forward this or delete it" are not the only options!

Following the investigation into Alvarez's background, Los Angeles County District Attorney investigators discovered that he had falsely claimed his ex-wife was married to him, and thus fraudulently received health insurance benefits. He was convicted of misappropriation of public funds, grand theft, and insurance fraud in 2009, and was sentenced to five years in state prison. He was discharged from Calipatria State Prison in March, 2012. Because he is a convicted felon, he is ineligible to hold public office in California.

On June 3, 2013, President Obama signed the Stolen Valor Act of 2013 that resolves the First Amendment issue with the original law by making it a crime for a person fraudulently to claim having received an award specified in the Act with the intention of obtaining money, property, or other tangible benefit thereby. So far, this law has not been successfully challenged.

What do you suppose will happen to the fake "Christians?"

John Lindorfer