If so, then the NSA is, strictly speaking, not in the “wrong.”
This is much more likely something Holder or Obama thought up. The articles I've read show that there were some abuses by NSA workers by listening into conversations and spying on international communications to or from the US with officers in Afghanistan and elsewhere. However, can any of you point to definite abuse mentioned by the NSA without having the Justice Department or FBI involved, first, along with a FISA judge?
What I’m getting at is this:
If no abuses were happening with the NSA on strictly domestic-to-domestic operations, then Snowden’s breach, to the extent that he’s stated, was not really appropriate. It would seem he should have broken open the abuses of the Obama Administration as to how they put information into the NSA’s purview, against standard procedure. Since the FBI or Justice Department was behind the indiscriminate capture of domestic-only information, we should be most bothered by that.
Again, is anyone aware of tools such as PRISM being used by the FBI or Justice Department? If the NSA is only spying on foreign communications, as it should, then these tools, although quite concerning, are being used in their appropriate ways. If the FBI or Justice Department are able to use them, then, with their charters (for all-domestic surveillance), we are screwed. It is this abuse, or the feeding of inappropriate information back to the FBI or Justice Department, that should have been stated by Snowden. As it is, he’s cr**ped on the military.
Generally, I trust our military (NSA) over our union-run civilian departments (Justice or FBI). The military is expected to refuse unlawful orders. The rest are just hacks.