Letter: Snooping violates privacy rights
A sign stands outside the National Security Administration campus in Fort Meade, Md. (June 6, 2013) Credit: AP
Another reader recently suggested that Edward Snowden is a traitor because he broke his vow to keep his work secret ["Snowden swore to keep U.S. secrets," Letters, July 8].
Going by that premise, if a government worker in Germany just before World War II had documents showing Adolf Hitler's plans for the Jews, would that person be a traitor for revealing them?
There is no guarantee that our government will always remain a democracy, and the fact is that the National Security Agency's information gathering is a clear violation of every citizen's right to privacy.
As Ben Franklin famously said, "He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security."
James Clark, Syosset
