Snowden's demeanor was all wrong too... the words were right - maybe focus group tested - but his attitude was cock-sure arrogance - didn't match the words. I'm guessing he also got help within the NSA...
“I’m guessing he also got help within the NSA...”
That’s the important part of the story. The outside help he got from Wikileaks associated people may be interesting from the point of view of possible legal actions against them, but that he was getting that help doesn’t tell us much. Based on no knowledge of how things works, it surprises me that a guy could be applying for a job in March, get hired, and be in a position to access deeply secret stuff by early June. Even if he had the requisite clearances from his former employment, and even if he couldn’t do his technical maintenance work without access to the secrets, should he be trusted so soon by his employer not to appropriate the files? In other words, why wasn’t somebody watching him? I’d like to know who greased the skids for him to get the job.