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You're arguing over proximate vs. ultimate causes, when both are causes.

This was proximately caused by Snowden disclosing what the NSA was doing. It was ultimately caused by NSA monitoring major swaths of the population.

ETA: decent summary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proximate_and_ultimate_causati...

Thanks for thatuseful distinction

I agree with other guy, that is a useful distinction and I didn’t know that’s what it was called.

I’ll still argue for ultimate cause because if it wasn’t Snowden it seems likely would have been someone else.

I’m a firm believer in don’t shoot the messenger, even if they are flawed.

Snowden helped bring those behaviors to light by being someone people could 'relate' to. Thus, calling attention to past, present, and future actions by certain agencies.

Unless you're trying to thank him.

True. Snowden made it happen :)