The suggestion that facial recognition cameras are pointed in the faces of ordinary Americans, just in case they do something the cops don’t like, is a pretty extraordinary proposition for a US consumer company to make.
The Rekognition pitch is encouraging the use of a specific controversial practice, rather than abstractly aiding the general compute capabilities of a large (if controversial to some) government department.
Snowden, Assange both shed light on massive surveillance and the outrage lasted a week. Now Assange and Snowden are seen in a less positive light as well by the same people who hailed them as defenders of freedom and transparency.
People are fickle.
There was a change in policy from: we don't generally presecute parents with children, to: prosecute all parents with children.
You don't think that change could have had anything to do with people's outrage?