Does Marcus end up Putin's lapdog against the West? As good as his disclosures are, fleeing to a state with much worse human rights records and pretty much a one-party klepocracy obsessed with annexing territories and controlling its neighbors isn't how most good stories end.

Why isn't he railing against Russia's SORM-1, SORM-2, and SORM-3? My concern here is that his disclosures won't change business as usual and will provide political cover for nations with just as bad, if not worse, human rights violations because the US's critics can just point to Snowden and deflect the conversation, which is EXACTLY what's happening now.

Bullshit. He didn't flee to Russia. He was fleeing through Russia, and we made it plain we'd down any plane we thought he might be on. What is he supposed to do? Leak Russian secrets? At this point, there's no good he can do better than remaining free and remain vocal - and that's what he's doing.

He didn't flee to Russia, he became stuck there.

As for why he isn't railing against other policies I suspect he recognizes how lucky he is to not be in the position Bradley Manning is in even after leaking so much. Snowden has done enough good for one lifetime anyway.

depending on what you believed he either ended up there as a result of having his passport revoked en route to ecuador (his story) or that was a ruse and he intended to stay in russia because it was the only state that could and would stand up to US pressure to extradite him (assange's claim); neither of these interpretations lend any credence to the idea that snowden condones the russian regime's policies. he has openly criticized putin's pre-scripted response to his question regarding russian state surveillance.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/18/vladimi...

For one thing, he was studying Russia in Geneva. With British help.