"As Snowden intended, the primary impact of the leaks was on political debate inside the United States."
I think the primary impact has been the complete erosion of whatever goodwill the United States had among the citizenry (n.b. not the governments) of her allies.
That obviously doesn't matter in the short term; but so many things don't matter in the short term.
I think the militarization of our local police forces and the tacit support of interdiction, confiscation and especially their extra-judicial killing of unarmed people has done more, but it's not an argument I want to win against your assertion at all.
>I think the primary impact has been the complete erosion of whatever goodwill the United States had among the citizenry (n.b. not the governments) of her allies.
I think the primary impact has been the complete erosion of whatever goodwill the United States had among the citizenry (n.b. not the governments) of her allies.
That obviously doesn't matter in the short term; but so many things don't matter in the short term.