Maybe it's because I've held a Top Secret security clearance once...

[MADem]

146. His testimony would not have been public.

It would have been in camera, behind closed doors. Rand could have sounded the alarm without being specific, and people on the Intel committee, assuming they agreed with him (and there would be some who did), would chime in. He'd go on the talkers, talk about the program in general terms, lay out his objections, and the press would circle like hounds at the scent--not just the Intel committees, but the WH as well. And of course, CIA, NSA and contractor sources would be shaken down.

Who knows what would be revealed, but tongues would be wagging and it would have provided Rand with both publicity and a level of gravitas he does not have now.

And it would have put the problem where change, if needed, could be effected without fucking the country over.

These actions by Snowden are either the actions of someone who just wants to blow up the system, or someone who is in deep personal crisis and is engaged in self-destruction on an international stage, like a slow suicide.

He isn't all that calm--listen closely to the timbre of his voice, it betrays him; he's made some substantial misstatements in his video interview (and that's twelve minutes that we're seeing out of several HOURS, if reports are accurate). He misstated his annual salary, and he got the very YEAR of his brief military service wrong. Seeing as he broke not one, but two legs that year, you'd think it might stick in his mind--it wasn't all that long ago. It's been many decades since I joined the military, but I can tell you the very date I went on active duty, as well as the date I retired. These are things people tend to remember.

Also, the cavalier way he abandoned his girlfriend, who schlepped all the way from the east coast to join him in his new Hawaiian life, was flat out cruel and a red flag to me, as though he wasn't going to be around to worry about her for long. She went from talking about her (future) "in-laws" as she cleaned and readied HIS house for their visit to Hawaii, to shutting down her blog as the media focused on her as the most famous, dumped and clueless ex-girlfriend on the face of the earth. She has every right to feel hurt and used and discarded.

If he really wanted to "fix" things, there are better ways than the path he chose. He left a path of destruction, like someone who just doesn't give a shit anymore. I'd wonder what was up with those seizures he had been having this past year--did they affect his behavior, his judgment, his thought processes, his emotional lability? Were they indicative of something terribly serious, and not just a (rather unusual) diagnosis of adult-onset epilepsy?

His choices aren't brave, they're incredibly stupid. There are reasons for these choices, and I just can't buy the "I don't want to live in a world where....." argument. It does not pass my smell test. You don't have a "Come to Jesus" epiphany moments after you accept a job in Hawaii after working in the NSA-CIA contracting world for years. Something else is going on with this guy--best case, a physical health issue that has caused behavioral changes or a personal, mental health crisis; worst case, he sold his soul and engaged in treasonous conduct for personal gain. YMMV.