You're completely dismissing the fact that he took an oath to keep certain secrets, and a few months later decided to take it upon himself that the entire world needed to know what he was working on. There are avenues to report these things, to voice concerns without completely going against your word. Call your government representatives, go up the chain. There are phone numbers to call and people to contact if you're uncomfortable.
It's people like you who make the whole issue a "black-or-white", "for us or against us" situation. Probably shouldn't assume that just because people have a different opinion on an issue are "just" anything.
Have you seen what happened to every whistleblower who did what you suggest? You'd have to be an idiot to follow them and expect different results.
This isn't black and white. There are legitimate reasons for and against the NSA spying program (I happen to fall on the side of it being too unchecked, but I can entertain the core idea of it). The Americans who believe the surveillance program is a good idea aren't sheeple you can just write off as a symptom of hysteria culture.
If you can't spend 10 minutes thinking about the NSA program and come up with reasons why it's a good idea, you're either not thinking hard enough or you're massively biased. The core idea is not stupid or unreasonable. It has a liability for abuse, which is the real problem with it, but the program stands on its own merit as a benefactor to homeland security with a few key changes.
My point is, you're writing off Americans who support this as being uninformed and outright wrong, but that's not fair to them. They have reasonable and legitimate reasons to support the NSA surveillance. They might not feel powerfully about it but they're not wrong just because it's vogue to hate this program. Open this as a conversation, not one where you have assymetrical, priveliged knowledge and a superior opinion of these things.
Also, are these Americans you're talking about supporters of the NSA surveillance, or do they simply oppose Snowden? In my opinion, there's a huge difference between the two groups, namely one is at least slightly informed, and the other is being fed lies by mainstream media.
I don't think anyone who thinks Snowden is a traitor actually has considered it at all, they are just eating up the standard post-911 narrative that has been driving this country for over a decade now. The problem is that being anti-terrorism is such a political bi-partisan pillar that even appearing to rationally consider the cost-benefit (let alone the constitutionality!) of something as obscene as the NSA's domestic spying program in its current form is political suicide . It's a sad state of affairs, but the public debate driven by politicians is based on the strength of Twitter-length arguments. Based on current sentiment, can you can concoct a stronger sound bite pro or anti NSA surveillance? Critical thinking doesn't enter into it at all.
That's why only the people can change this debate. We need to convince each other of the slippery slope we're on, and the futility of an ever-increasing police state in 100% prevention of terrorism. Then we need to make the politicians aware that we do believe in the first and fourth ammendments, and that we will not allow our proxy power to be used to spy on ourselves en masse, and we will vote out of office any politician who does not respect the limits of government power.
A little help from the media would be nice, but big media is almost as beholden to political winds as politicians are these days.