Snowden, *by law*, needed to do what he did.

[JDPriestly]

38. I think that our conservative Supreme Court might well distinguish Smith v. Maryland.

After all, they decided in favor of enforcing the Second Amendment against laws that attempted to place broad limitations on guns. And they have, in my opinion, interpreted the First Amendment far too broadly in Citizens United. This Court, in my opinion, reads the Constitution so as to protect individual rights and limit government.

I first observed that in 1997 when the Court, now somewhat changed but still pretty conservative, overturned a decision allowing a law that prohibited guns in vehicles near schools. (I think those were the facts of the case.) Decisions on stops and searches in public areas have been pretty lenient on the police. But the issues with the NSA surveillance and collection of metadata are not like those in the stop and search decisions in my opinion. The auto searches take place in public. The driver knows he is being stopped. The NSA surveillance is very intrusive. There is no safety-related reason for the surveillance, at least not a very persuasive one. I just think the decision on the NSA surveillance if brought on the right facts at the right time could go against the NSA. It might take a few cases to get the Court to rule against the NSA, but I think it will happen unless we have some sort of coup or horrible event first.