[throwawayq3423]

Edward Snowden had stolen the most sensitive classified secrets from The United States Intelligence Community and Donald Trump is looking to squash dissent of his attempts to nullify the Constitution and establish a dictatorship.

I get what you're saying, but please have some perspective. the two things are not even remotely similar.

[monocasa]

To be fair, those sensitive secrets included secret, unconstitutional, dragnet surveillance programs targeting american citizens, and the fact that the director of national intelligence had perjured himself during congressional hearings on those programs.

[throwawayq3423]

Less than 1% of what Snowden took and leaked pertained to domestic surveillance programs, The rest was intelligence capabilities and sources and methods.

But that's besides the point. There is a real argument that the U.S. government, in trying to catch Snowden, was protecting national security. There is no such argument with Trump.

[tehjoker]

What they did to snowden was illegitimate but at least they had the cover that he was an insider that had signed a contract with the government. They are going after random ass people expressing a 1A opinion now. Legally very different ballgames even though both dissenters are correct to voice their opinions and knowledge and should not have been pursued for objecting to extravagant government wrongdoing.

[esseph]

> I get what you're saying, but please have some perspective. the two things are not even remotely similar.

Snowden sacrificed a comfortable life, his friends, and family to tell the American people they were being lied to. He exposed things that people SHOULD HAVE gone to prison for. Snowden is a hero, period.

[throwawayq3423]

> Snowden sacrificed a comfortable life

Yes and all he had to gain was international celebrity.

Please understand the role that ego plays in actions such as this.

[iugtmkbdfil834]

Friend, if you followed Snowden's saga at all, you would know that those events don't need to be similar to be relevant to the discussion at hand. In other words, just because you have a problem with Trump, does not mean the two issues are not connected.

[throwawayq3423]

Who was imprisoned for their speech against the US president by Obama and how did Snowden stop that?

Because that is exactly what we're talking about here. And if you don't have a like-for-like comparison, then we have nothing to discuss.