Leaks Support Democracy
Striking that OG, like Ellsberg, Manning, Snowden, Schulte, Winner, Drake, several others, who were recruited into classified arenas with clean records, were gradually changed by their expiriences from secrets keepers to secrets disclosers, though not as mercenary spies but as loyal citizens who believed it their duty to expose violations of long-standing constitutional rights of the public.
This is hardly new in the American experience of citizen-derived power of governance in contrast to authoritarian regimes which favor a few against the many. The USA was founded for this purpose and has benefited from those who reveal insider corruption and abuse of privilege.
And that tradition has been accompanied by another which aims to demonize and criminalize the disclosers of official secrets, which mirrors the punishments of authoritarians have always laid upon defiers of authority.
Perhaps the lesson to be learned from this episode is the same as those learned from the many predecessors: there will always be some dissenters to centralized secrets-worshshiping authority, perhaps not as many as those who reap the benefits of keeping secrets.
Worth keeping in mind, though, of those who benefit of by conveying disclosures, those who cultivate both sides to feather their own nests. Betrayal of trust is a swell duplicity which empowers bandits which appears to have become a major feature of digital technology.
Mis- and dis-information and outright lies are a very old profession.