• linearchaos@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    When he first leaked the information out, I really felt bad for the guy and I followed him pretty closely. He knowingly threw * his life away to let people know that X,Y and z were happening. But *as he started getting passed around slowly from journalist to journalist, They started asking him questions. It became more and more obvious that he was just some kind of average dude, that saw something wanted to say something and needed to make sure that he could cover his ass.

    I honestly think that the US handled it poorly. *He was a whistleblower, guy cared, guy was in the public eye It had at least a decent trove of data.

    They should have brought him back in, giving him some conditional amnesty and had him help them dismantle the leak as much as possible. Then they could have give him a cushy job gag ordered him and had him come out of the public eye immediately.

    Once he was seeking asylum the only way he’s going to be able to pay for that asylum is with the information he pilfered. Once he is out in no man’s land and stuck, the decisions that he made are not all going to be his own. *There will even the ones that he will make in resentment.

    I truly believe his initial act was absolutely made with good intentions, but he got trapped and was drawn down into things that were bigger than he was capable of sorting out.

    In the end the US government allowed him to owe a debt to the Russian government. And that was never going to play out well.

    *God, Google dictation sucks