Last week we got a phone call from a law firm in Washington, D.C., asking for a copy of a story written in March 2009 for use in a brief to be submitted before the Supreme Court.

The story dealt with a Sumner man named Steven Bennest, who was convicted by a federal court for making false claims about military medals and decorations – including a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star – in an attempt to receive additional military compensation from the government.

Bennest served in the military, but he was never awarded either medal.

The judge called Bennest’s actions “shameful and hurtful to other soldiers” and sentenced him to 24 months of probation and community service.

The prosecution was part of “Operation Stolen Valor,” designed to crack down on those claiming honors they did not receive.

The story is to be used as part of a brief in the case United States v. Alvarez, a challenge to the Stolen Valor Act, enacted by Congress in 2006. The case deals with a California man elected to a position on a water board in 2007. During the campaign, Javier Alvarez stood up and announced that he was a retired Marine who won the Congressional Medal of Honor.

The problem is that Alvarez was never awarded the medal of honor, nor was he ever even in the military.

Alvarez was charged and convicted of violating the Stolen Valor Act for “falsely representing verbally that he had been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor when, in truth and as he knew, he had not.” He is the first person charged and convicted under the law.

Basically, Mr. Alvarez is a real-world version of Jon Lovitz’s old pathological liar character from Saturday Night Live (“Yeah, that’s the ticket…”).

We’re not sure if our story about the Bennest case will be used in his defense or in defense of the act, but the case itself raises some interesting questions.

The Ninth Circuit ruled the Stolen Valor Act unconstitutional because lying is protected speech and has been considered such in precedent after precedent. Certain potentially dangerous lies – like yelling fire in a theater – are not protected speech, but in general, you absolutely have a right to fib in the United States, even about a military past, apparently.

“If the act is constitutional … 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 smoke, drink alcoholic beverages, is a virgin, or has not exceeded the speed limit while driving,” reads the majority opinion.

It’s an interesting philosophical argument though: should Congress be able to criminalize lying about one’s military service and/or receiving awards?

The idea behind the law is that people lying about awards demeans those who get them and demoralizes the troops. The Ninth Circuit, rightfully, stated that is ridiculous, adding that the troops do not undertake risky mission in hopes of winning an award.

The majority, one of whom was appointed by President George H.W. Bush and one appointed by President George W. Bush (the dissent was written by a judge appointed by President George W. Bush), ruled that while “we have no doubt society would be better off if Alvarez would stop spreading worthless, ridiculous, and offensive untruths,” the government has not shown any reason to infringe on the First Amendment.

Basically, it’s the “you don’t have to like it, but that’s what freedom looks like” argument.

I tend to agree.

But I do think there should be some sort of other provision for lies told in a campaign setting. It seems to me that for the electoral process to work, we have to be able to choose between two candidates and if one is lying, we cannot make an informed and/or proper decision.

Would Alvarez still have won if people didn’t think he was a Medal of Honor winner? No one can know. But it seems to me that if I voted for him and found out he was lying about his background, I would feel my vote has been stolen.

In Washington, for example, we have laws against candidate mailings containing false or misleading statements. In fact, during last year’s highly contentious 31st district State Senate race between former Sumner councilman Matt Richardson and Sen. Pam Roach, Roach won a case she brought against Richardson for false statements about sanctions levied against Roach by the Republican Caucus.

The judge dismissed Richardson’s arguments as to why the statements should be allowed and said a person seeking elected office has a “higher duty” than an ordinary citizen to make sure statements in the voter pamphlet are accurate before ordering them changed.

Which is totally a law I can get behind. Shoot, there’s times I’d like to be able to charge some of our regular letter-writers with lying about things or so terribly distorting (and editing) the truth to make it seem as if a person is actually taking the opposite stand he was making (ask me sometime about Henry Morganthau).

Mitt Romney recently released an ad like this, editing a quote from President Obama to make it look like he is saying that if he keeps talking about the economy he is going to lose, even though the actual statement made by then candidate Obama was a quote from his opponent’s campaign manager.

Kind of changes the whole message, doesn’t it?

The ad received a “pants on fire” label from Politifact, a nonpartisan fact-checking service.

To be fair, the president’s campaign has also been smacked down in recent weeks for similar distortions he has made about Romney.

Frankly, I think both should be fined.

I mean, I am all for being able to lie but doing so in a campaign is very different.

But the Stolen Valor Act doesn’t deal with campaigns; simply stating that you have a medal is now illegal so it will be interesting to see how the Supreme Court – one of the most conservative we’ve had in decades – rules on the Alvarez case.

First, the decision came from the Ninth Circuit, which the most hated circuit in the federal system by conservatives. Second, it deals with protecting and elevating military service, another favorite issue of the right (and rightfully so; serving our country is one of the most noble pursuits an American can take and I am thankful every day for the volunteers who keep my cowardly self off the front line).

But the opinion is a conservative opinion – one of government overreach – so it really could go either way.

The case is scheduled to get to the Supreme Court next spring. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Unless I’m lying, of course. Which at least for now is still legal.

Yeah, that’s the ticket…

By Brian Beckley

Staff Writer