I've read many articles on this guy and while Bradley Manning acted maliciously when divulged US secrets, Snowden seems to be more of an ideologue....a libertarian ideologue.
Briefly, this guy who dropped out of high school was particularly skilled at IT stuff and he quickly rose in the CIA, even that he was being stationed overseas with diplomatic cover identities. It was during this time that he became aware of just how far the US government gave itself the right to monitor all manner of communication by US citizens. So after years of observing this, he decided to expose the practices that he saw as unconstitutional and un-American.
He carefully chose only those documents that revealed questionable NSA practices of surveillance, and discarded any document, the disclosure of which might endanger a person. Bradly Manning took no such precaution.
As a libertarian myself, I get why Snowden did what he did. I know the people on FOX News are getting the vapors over it, but should they? We are seeing an unprecedented level of government surveillance of US citizens going about their private lives. If it's not stopped, then at least we should be aware of it.
It seems that with every new intrusion, the government tells us like children that it's for our own safety from the terrorists. BULLSHIT! Unless it is shown that Snowden's actions actually made us less safe from the terrorists....and in a very specific manner, then I'm taking his side for now.
I'd rather my communications be relatively private and accept a slightly higher level of risk from terrorism, than know my government is watching every move I make and storing data to be used against me at some later date if needed.
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