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Comment by zer0faith | Hacker News Reader

Sadly, they will attempt to make an example out of Snowden to discourage anyone from EVER doing something like this again.

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The thing people seem unable to do with Snowden is separate the intention of his actions with the impact. I have no doubt he had the right intentions. Informing the people of the gross violations of civil liberties is a noble endeavor.

However, the impact that it had and the manner in which he conducted it, and the channels he went through to do so had a dramatically negative impact on sources and methods. Real people in the field were put into actual danger as a direct result of his actions. US National Security was hampered as a result. The biggest rejoicers were arguably our two biggest threats: Russia, whom we have been fighting a proxy war in the middle east for ages now, and China and that alone should tell you something. People who believe they are doing the right thing for their country were endangered, and my country's ability to keep us safe was hampered.

Surely there was a way to let the appropriate people in charge know about these programs, and maybe had a greater possibility of enacting actual change, because as it stands right now, while we are more informed as a people, exactly zilch has changed since 2013.

You should read the book... nobody was put in danger. Snowden is an American hero.

You should talk to an actual intelligence officer or two. I have, which is where I got that impression from.

You mean the people Snowden warned us about don't like him much?

That's like someone being stalked by a police officer being told to call the police

It's more along the lines of, and the maturity required to understand that, there are two sides to every story and the people on the "other side" are human beings, too, and in fact, not your enemy. Average Americans most of them, believe it or not. Chances are some of them have been your friend, neighbor, church member, frat bro/sorority sis, etc.

The "other" side here is looking for an Orwellian dystopian society. They aren't nice people.

A lot of (or even most) members of totalitarian organisations are "average X", good neighbours, church members etc etc.

I'd suggest to read some Arendt.

If whistleblowers weren’t so often targeted by the government in retaliation or to silence, your argument would have merit.

The fact that zilch has changed has nothing to do with him. We are the electorate and if people really gave a damn about it, which most people don't because this is too abstract and far from concrete for them, then things would have changed or at least started to. The biggest thing that's been done is Apple advertising privacy as a feature in their product releases.

Please show some evidence as to why you think the country's ability to keep us safe was hampered? Has the government shown anywhere that an attack that could have been thwarted wasn't?

People need to get off their high horse. Mass collection of data isn't a method of security. It's a method that's used to try and make up for lack of it. Let's collect all the shit we can and hope to find a needle in a haystack. We have more serious issues to take care of in this country. Sick people are walking around toting assault weapons and IMHO a large swath of the population is suffering from some sort of mental illness which is being allowed to rage unchecked.

Surely there was a way to let the appropriate people in charge know about these programs

They've been informed. Perhaps not in a way that you or they might approve of, but they've certainly been informed, loudly and clearly.

Of course,

zilch has changed

It would be a mistake to assume that blowing the whistle quietly, politely, and up the chain of command, might have had better results. The only difference would be that the public would still be in the dark to this very day.

You can say this about any whistle-blowing activity, really. In the short-run it's always better for stability to cover-up your crimes. I think there are 2 straightforward rebuttals to this:

1. It seem strange that you're blaming the whistleblower, and not the people who violated the constitution to begin with. This is (vaguely) like blaming the dentist for the pain of a root canal instead of your poor eating & hygiene.

2. In the long run, trust in its institutions is critical to US power. The US was a good place to do business specifically because you could trust that you would be treated fairly, speak freely, and the government shouldn't be spying on you. If these institutions stop working, the trust will eventually go away.

You suggest there could be some sort of "other way" that would actually enact change, that way is US citizens voting for lawmakers who care about this.

It's hard to buy the party line these days. The intelligence services come across as gigantic incompetent bureaucracies. They didn't prevent 9/11, concocted fake WMDs, thousand drone strikes later they are handing Afghanistan back to the Taliban, were fast asleep to the dangers of Fake news/Social Media issues and had no clue where Trump or Brexit came from. After all that why do you believe them?

The "appropriate people in charge" were well aware of these programs

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