I believe this is the underlying cause of their security issues. People involved cannot voice their dissent so they act it out.

The NSA and CIA are institutions established to protect a nation that abides by the rule of law.

When the rule of law is brushed aside the people who are part of that system rebel.

I very frankly believe one of the more patriotic things an American with the ability can do is emulate Snowden, i.e. infiltrate and expose the NSA’s domestic surveillance programs.

But it's not patriotic to give NSA tools to the Russians, to hurt the ability of the NSA to spy on Russia.

Wtf does patriotic have to do with anything but mass manipulation?

These weapons are not designed to be patriotic; they can just as easily hurt anyone.

its ultimately in the best interests of all of us to understand how little we can count on the systems we use today to keep information private.

how likely do you think it is that the russians or the chinese or anyone really has developed similar exploits?

Who gave NSA tools to the Russians?

Presumably, a traitor within the NSA or a contractor.

See: https://medium.com/@thegrugq/the-great-cyber-game-commentary...

Why Russia?

I don't think that from their perspective they are overlooking the constitution.

All of their "illegal" programs are duly authorized by executive orders and DOJ legal opinions and signed off on by the intelligence committees.

You or me may view those operations as illegal but they are following orders given by democratically elected officials and signed off on by every level of the judiciary.

Ultimately I don't think it is productive to scapegoat the intelligence community for what is fundamentally a breakdown in the rule of law and democratic process. They are participants in that, but so is every voter, and every politician, not to mention all the corporations that happily do their work for them in exchange for money or favors and then lie about it.

This is the correct answer.

The NSA doesn't spy on Americans.

If you look at the Snowden leaks, it talks of filters limiting access to collected data to foreign nationals and people contacting foreign nationals only, as per laws allowed under the US constitution.

Why would a TOP SECRET program have these filters if their operations were illegal?

Everything the NSA does is legal. It's now up to the public to accept that fact.

I think it’s because there’s way more context to All of the stories we’ve been exposed to. We can’t judge their opinions or thoughts when we don’t know the additional details they have that would skew or change context.