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Comment by jacquesm | Hacker News Reader

Employee-employer loyalty in situations like these is often substituted or at least augmented by patriotism, the moral obligation to serve some conceptual ideal that is presumably exhibited by the motherland.

Such motivations, especially when entrenched early in life can be quite powerful. I think there is some truth to the fact that Gen X/Y members will be harder to keep buttoned up when given secret clearances but it won't be quite as hard as it would be without the patriotic angle.

What the probable response will be against these leaks is a change in hiring practices (less reliance on subcontractors) and more thorough vetting procedures.

Rather than, what we'd all like to see (huge assumption on my part there): a more transparent and surgical use of these capabilities with much better oversight in place.

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I think that patriotism is a very powerful motivation in the actions of potential whistleblowers.

Previous generations had the Nazis and then the Soviets as the 'enemy' and they were tangible opponents. Potential whistleblowers might have been able to convince themselves that they were acting for the greater good, and kept themselves quiet.

The new 'enemy' are the terrorists, and they are neither particularly tangible or visible. It is not so easy to convince yourself you are acting for the greater good in these circumstances.

In actuality, the reverse happens. Snowden's patriotism convinced him that the actions of the NSA could not be justified as 'greater goods', and so he became a whistleblower.

Also, if newer generations are more independently minded, i.e. less influenced by patriotism and the like, then I guess they are likely to support a David over a Goliath. Pressuring people like Assange and Snowden is just making them into historic figureheads.

It's the double-edged nature of imaginary threats: you can invoke them to justify pretty much anything (invasive airport searches? Al Qaeda! invasive net censorship? Paedophiles!), but the number of people actually believing the bogeymen exist gets lower and lower every time you use them.

Isn't the saying, to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic?

By rights the Marines should have been kicking the NSA's doors in.

Why would the Marines do that though? The NSA is the ones telling them whose doors to kick down in Iraq and Afghanistan, as opposed to the normal 2006 routine of getting blown up every convoy by an IED.

Probably not actually; the NSA isn't big on HUMINT.

And because no-one wants to win a war against a repressive political ideology and come home to find more of the same?

Kicking in doors: something you'd totally never see in a repressive political ideology.

Funny they couldn't tell them Iraq did not have WMD when it mattered.

I seem to recall that's exactly what the Intelligence Community did tell the Prez, was that the public claims were all out of proportion to what the intel community knew, or even has hints at knowing. But of course Saddam threatened his Poppy and off we went...

But just think of the bright side, if we accept as true the claims of those using the Arab Spring erupting from Manning's diplomatic cable leaks, that it's all worth it if we get more democracies in the end, then I suppose all's well that ends well.

Mind, I don't personally agree with that but apparently I've been the idiot here the whole time. :)

The 'Arab Spring' is called a bit early in my opinion, chances are that it will be an Autumn.

Kicking the first stone of an avalanche downhill is easy but there is no way of knowing when the stones will stop rolling and if the new configuration is a favourable one and what the damage incurred along the way is.

I think it has more to do with whether you were imbued with conformity or not. It's hard to argue that Snowden's behavior isn't patriotic, much as Obama and the NSA keep trying.

No doubt at all that Snowden is patriotic in nature. But that won't stop a lot of well meaning people from doing the opposite in the name of patriotism either.

>Employee-employer loyalty in situations like these is often substituted or at least augmented by patriotism, the moral obligation to serve some conceptual ideal that is presumably exhibited by the motherland.

This statement seems ambiguous. In the context of Snowden, are you claiming he is motived by patriotism to go against the wishes of his employer or would be motivated to stay within the constraints of his employer both due to patriotism?

That depends on the person. Some will go against their government out of patriotism, others (the vast majority) will likely support it due to the same.

Whose reasons are better is subject of much discussion, I merely note that patriotism can be used to push people into a more conforming role than a mere employer employee relationship would. I can't imagine those that start out to be against their current form of government to either apply for or to be able to easily pass attitude screening, which I would assume to be sop for such positions.

Of course any screen is imperfect and I would think that right now a lot of people are trying to figure out how they missed Snowden. Which effectively increases internal paranoia in the various agencies.

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