I don't think the author is saying "treat my rights as your primary motiviation", nor is he saying "you should be more concerned about other people's rights tha

I don't think the author is saying "treat my rights as your primary motiviation", nor is he saying "you should be more concerned about other people's rights than your own." What he is saying is that the American discourse over these violations — violations perpetrated by agencies within America upon as you say everyone's rights — tends to dehumanize anyone who isn't American. It seems that if the NSA had been using their Prism dragnet to target only non-Americans, then there would be no public outcry at all — as if the real outrage is the fact that American citizens might be the target of these blatantly illegal and wide-reaching abuses of power. Perhaps, as you say, this is simply the American public "looking inwards" to it's own problems, but I'd argue that this is not your own problem. It's everyone's problem, and we all deserve equal treatment.