REBLOG: The Heart of the Matter: Memo To Authoritarians: The "Oath" is to the Constitution, Not to Secrecy

Barry Eisler (like me) was a federal employee.  Unlike me he was in the intel community as a CIA operative.  He took the same oath I did, and the oath he describes in his recent post The Heart of the Matter: Memo To Authoritarians: The "Oath" is to the Constitution, Not to Secrecy.  He makes the really important point that the Oath in question is about protecting the Constitution - and given what we know about PRISM and Edward Snowden's other leaked programs I would argue that Mr. Snowden was, in fact, trying to defend the Constitution (since this kind of vast undirected data gathering for purposes of "finding" terrorists violates the 4th Amendment).  Funny, how every one but the President takes this oath, and now they are all using it to hide from the public consequences of that Oath lived out.