The article, “Why Snowden Won’t (and Shouldn’t) Get Clemency” written by Fred Kaplan, an author and the Edward R Murrow press fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, takes issue with regarding Snowden as a whistleblower. Although he believes that some of Snowden’s revelations, namely those that pertain to domestic issues about surveillance, might warrant some measure of leniency, he feels much more condemning about Snowden’s release of material that involved international communications that are directly related to the national security of the US.

Because of those activities, Kaplan’s attitude about Snowden is much harsher, and he thoroughly rejects the idea of Snowden as a whistleblower. He also bristles at the comparison of Snowden with Daniel Ellsberg, illustrating several differences. These include the fact that Ellsberg had first approached various senators and other news outlets to try to get publicity about the story, and only resorted to releasing them to the New York Times when he was unable to get the attention of our leaders through traditional means. Additionally, the Pentagon Papers were historical documents rather than covert communications, and they did not contain information about ongoing peace talks or tactical operations (Kaplan.)

The intended audience of this article is the American public, most likely in particular people who have adopted a sympathetic attitude towards Snowden and may have been supporting the idea that he should be issued clemency. He successfully captures the attention of the reader by informing people of his credentials in tackling issues of national security and taking different points of view. For example, he says, he regards Daniel Ellsberg is a patriot, but at the same time he condemned James Clapper for lying to Congress, and believed that he should have been fired. By mentioning these issues, he demonstrates that his record is selective when it comes to his support of national figures and their activities.

This was a very interesting analysis of the Snowden situation, because I have always regarded Edward Snowden as a whistleblower who ultimately did a service to the country by uncovering NSA surveillance and wiretaps of American citizens as well as foreigners. I have been much more cognizant about privacy violations and the need to take as many steps as possible to try to limit access to all of my wireless and telephone communications. However, as Kaplan pointed out, there are several troubling questions about Snowden’s actions. For instance, why did he go to Hong Kong and then Russia, and what information did he share with those governments?

In regards to the definition of “whistleblower” I still, however, believe that Edward Snowden fits the traditional definition. If a whistleblower is an employee who discloses information that he reasonably believes is evidence of illegality… Abuse of power… Or a substantial and specific danger to public health and safety” then his actions certainly meet that criteria (What Is a Whistleblower?) Many people as well as reputable organizations have described Snowden as a whistleblower as well; according to the Guardian, Snowden will go down in history as one of America’s most consequential whistleblowers, alongside Daniel Ellsberg and Bradley Manning (Greenwald.)

When he released the first set of documents, he included a note saying that he understood that he would be condemned because of his actions, but it would bring him satisfaction if “secret law, unequal pardon, and irresistible executive powers are revealed even for an instant” (Greenwald.) Nearly 25% of people polled, however, use the word “traitor” to describe Snowden with only 8% saying that he is brave, courageous, or patriotic (De Pinto.) Clearly, Americans are conflicted about how to regard Snowden but unlike myself, tend not to regard him as a whistleblower.Nor do the top security heads in the United States. James Clapper, who was mentioned in the original article as having lied to Congress, has spoken openly about the tremendous damage that Snowden’s release of materials have caused, causing the nation to be less secure (Meek.)