Goverment is clever enought to change the law befor doing anything. So they can clame that what they do is within the law.

What non-legal consequences did the counterexamples in this article face? I'm not sure what you mean.

Why does technicality matter? It's not like being 'legal' or 'non-legal' even matters when it's a pliable circumstance (which is really the problem exposed here) crafted by the law makers that are at work doing their best to serve themselves over the rights of the people (which is kinda the purpose of laws).

Edit: this comment is not specific to your question alone, it's a comment on this specific thread.

Well the prosecution was lying to the judge:

"The Drake case collapsed in spectacular fashion when the judge found that the information Drake possessed was completely unclassified, and had only been marked otherwise after it was seized from his home."

I did not phrase that properly. I meant: technically in the law books and interpreted as such, but violates the spirit of the law and is unconstitutional. At the risk of beating a dead and buried horse, consider the legal definition of "torture".

I doubt he would have had assassins on his trail, but he would have been put through the legal system the same way Manning was.

Also consider the court of public opinion -- there's enough of an uninformed mass who think this is a scumbag who gave American secrets to China and Russia that an administration can bend the laws quite a bit and get away with it.

Actually he wouldn't have been "put through the legal system the same way Manning was," because Manning was a soldier tried under military law, while Snowden was a civilian contractor.

I don't know which law you are consulting for the definition of "torture," but if solitary confinement is torture then our system hands it out for many people less famous and glamorous than Snowden all the time, without much of any outcry. And this outcry seems to be confined to certain political figures, not just any prisoner caught with a shank.

Financial ruin, stress put on family and friends, etc.