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Absolutely. Also remember this was a thought experiment, not a conspiracy theory.

FYI, not sure why you're using quotes around Character assassination. It is a fixed expression in English, it's not something I made up: 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_assassination 2. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/character%20assass...

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I used quotes because I don't know if it's actually possible to assassinate the character of a government organization, in the sense that I'm not sure if a government organization has a character to be assassinated per se. Generally I'd save that term for individuals. I wasn't being flippant.

Sorry, I was speaking of character assassination of Edward Snowden, not of the NSA. I did not intend to insinuate you were being flippant, it was very possible you had not known this turn of phrase (not everyone is a native English speaker).

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