I'm a leftist, not a libertarian, but I always feel compelled to bring up a specific point in Snowden's defense when he is mentioned to divisive opinions:
He did speak up correctly, using the correct channels, and the proper channels told him to shut the fuck up.
Then he again did what he did the rightest way he could, by giving the data to one of the oldest members of the fourth estate, the press, to decide proper course, ONLY AFTER the primary state failed him spectacularly.
He revealed massive warrantless domestic surveillance. The 1700s equivalent would be if the post office made copies of every single letter everyone sent and then promised not to read them unless the sender or recipient was one day subject to a valid warrant. Whoever revealed this info would've been a hero and a patriot back then, and it should be the same today.
Snowden leaked his info about these programs more than a decade ago. If that is what the three-letter agencies and big tech were capable of doing in secret then, just imagine the shady shit they're doing now.
Blow the whistle. But don't run away to another country with several laptops and hard drives of shit. Yeah if they figure out it was you, you're going to prison for a few years. However you will be released by a future president, if you're even still in prison by that time. That's the pattern, it's been the pattern since the late cold war.
Not a lot of respect for him since he went to an enemy state that is far worse in the human rights field. If you feel like you need to break the law to share classified info you should be willing to go to jail for it, not run off to fucking Russia.