Edward Snowden

What the government wants is something they never had before. They want total awareness. The question is, is that something we should be allowing?

Citizens with a conscience are not going to ignore wrong-doing simply because they'll be destroyed for it: the conscience forbids it.

Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American, and the more panicked talk we hear from people like him... the better off we all are.

Even if you're not doing anything wrong, you are being watched and recorded.

I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong.

I would rather be without a state than without a voice.

Bathtub falls and police officers kill more Americans than terrorism, yet we've been asked to sacrifice our most sacred rights for fear of falling victim to it.

It may be that by watching everywhere we go, by watching everything we do, by analyzing every word we say, by waiting and passing judgment over every association we make and every person we love, that we could uncover a terrorist plot, or we could discover more criminals. But is that the kind of society we want to live in?

I will be satisfied if the federation of secret law, unequal pardon and irresistible executive powers that rule the world that I love are revealed even for an instant.

The immoral cannot be made moral through the use of secret law.

I've been a spy for almost all of my adult life - I don't like being in the spotlight.

I think it's important to remember that people don't set their lives on fire. They don't walk away from their extraordinarily, extraordinarily comfortable lives ... for no reason.