At no point in time did I ever see a concrete effort of the administrative or judicial to protect Snowden and not do anything but seek the harshest punishment a

At no point in time did I ever see a concrete effort of the administrative or judicial to protect Snowden and not do anything but seek the harshest punishment against him. In fact, most rhetoric supported the NSA's actions and demanded justice in what they saw as a criminal act. Perhaps, the court of popular opinion might have swayed the forces that be into thinking different. Looking at other whistleblowers like Manning would only lead a foolish person to believe that likely. As a result, I firmly believe Snowden used this as his get out of jail card to gain sympathy from Hong Kong residents. The US and its citizens already failed him, why would he place his life in their hands? He very clearly stated he was going to place his life in the hands of Hong Kong and its rule of law, not the US.