Scott's fundamental assertion is that the news is a waste of time because it can't possibly influence his actions (apart from politically, but he's happy to vote off of voter information brochures provided with the ballot, a kind of news proxy).

The actors in this particular Snowden story are heads of state: Obama/Kerry/Hillary on the US side, and Merckel/Gabriel on the German side. At it's heart is the revelation by Gabriel to Greenwald (the author of the piece) that the US threatened Germany over Snowden.

We already know that the USG over-whelminging considers Snowden a criminal and a traitor. (And one of his precious few supporters in the Senate, Mark Udall(D-NM) lost his re-election campaign.

We already know that the USG has no moral scruples against taking any action it deems in it's interest. It has tortured and killed innocent people, lied to justify invading foreign countries, invaded the personal privacy of allied heads of state, and invaded the privacy of everyone in the world, including private US citizens and corporations.

We already know that the US public, the final arbiter of what is right and wrong, isn't outraged by any of this enough to make a serious difference at the polls.

What good does it do me to learn about one more way in which my government works against my interests and moral sensibilities?