Within the American military and the veterans’ community there is no more despicable crime than that of Stolen Valor. It took years for us to convince Congress that representing oneself as a veteran or a military member when one is not, should be a criminal act. The catalyst that finally moved Congress to action was the book, Stolen Valor: How the Vietnam Generation Was Robbed of Its Heroes and Its History by B.G. “Jug” Burkett, a former Army officer and Vietnam veteran, and Glenna Whitely. Burkett and Whitely assembled a comprehensive and compelling argument that most of the homeless losers, loners and druggies the mainstream media spotlighted as typical Vietnam veterans were in fact phonies who had either never served in the military, or if they had, had never been anywhere close to Vietnam. Congress passed the first Stolen Valor act in 2005 but it was seldom enforced and ultimately struck down in 2012 by the Supreme Court as a too broadly written limitation on...(Read Full Article)