that's such as tom drake and others, that's what snowden would be facing. he would be facing a jail cell from the time he step off the plane here, the plane that john kerry offered him. he would be stepping into handcuffs and he would probably never get out unless the he is pea onnage act is changed to allow a defense of public benefit, public interest in which these matters could be brought up. that's what congress should do and even before that the supreme court should at last rule on those aspects that they are unconstitutional, violations of the first amendment and freedom of press. >> we are going to have to leave it there. it is a fascinating parallel. thank you so much for bringing

highest officials in nsa, technical people, ed loomis, tom drake, all gone to the inspector general and for that had their careers ruined, several resigned, all of them raided by the fbi and lost computers on suspicion that they had given the truth of what they were saying to the ig, inspector general and to congress about the nsa criminal listening in without a warrant on hundreds of millions of americans. they had told that but not to the press as they should have i must say. they had gone to the congress and to the ig exactly as kerry

that's such as tom drake and others, that's what snowden would be facing. he would be facing a jail cell from the time he step off the plane here, the plane that john kerry offered him. he would be stepping into handcuffs and he would probably never get out unless the he is

i knew that couldn't be true, that it was just collateral damage. >> narrator: tom drake's home was not raided by the fbi that day, but drake had the feeling that he was next. >> almost six months goes by and drake still hasn't been raided. but then on the morning of november 28, 2007... >> i'm seeing these cars pull up as i look out the window. it's just after 7:00 a.m. in the morning and there's a dozen fbi agents. and my heart's up in my throat, because i realize it's now me. >> narrator: the fbi's search warrant said they were looking for evidence that drake was the new york timleaker. >> drake being drake sits down at his kitchen table with the fbi agents without a lawyer present and spends the entire day trying to convince them that the real culprits are the people at the nsa who have run this illegal program. >> so i told them everything i could, but they didn't want to hear about that. they wanted to hear about the new york timand sources. >> narrator: the fbi carted away drake's computers and boxes of his papers. drake waited. >> a few months later, in april 2008, drake gets a

and snowden did particularly admire tom drake and what drake didn't have and that snowden decided heto provide documentary evidence of what he was saying to reporters. that would force the u.s. government to take on the questions in a substantive way. >> and force the government, he did. coming up, general alexander and his agency are dragged from the shadows of secrecy into the harsh light of public scrutiny. >>> to some, edward snowden's actions were heroic, to others, villainous, but all agreed his deeds represented a massive security failure at the nsa. >> he offered to resign, and i gave it to the chairman, the secretary of defense and the dni and they took it to the white house and everybody said no. >> he still had the confidence of the white house, but congress was growing skeptical. indeed, senator rand paul went so far as to file a lawsuit against the nsa for its bulk collection of data. >> we are filing suit in defense of the fourth amendment. >> where does that stand now? >> we're in federal court. we haven't had a ruling yet. it really is a question, can a single warrant

. >> for tom drake, edward snowden represented redemplgs.ed to have the debate and whether or not we can actually be this kind of society. >> snowden had carefully studied what had happened to people before him who had tried to object to national security policies or practices. and snowden did particularly admire tom drake and what drake didn't have and that snowden decided he needed was to provide documentary evidence of what he was saying to reporters. that would force the u.s. government to take on the questions in a substantive way. >> and force the government, he did. coming up, general alexander and his say generalcy are -- and his say generalcy are dragged into the harsh life of public scrutiny. sfrs how can i ease this pain? (man) when i can't go, it's like bricks piling up. i wish i could find some relief. (announcer) ask your doctor about linzess-- a once-daily capsule for adults with ibs with constipation or chronic idiopathic constipation. linzess is thought to help calm pain-sensing nerves and accelerate bowel movements. it help

. >> for tom drake, edward snowden represented redemption.have the debate and whether or not we can actually be this kind of society. >> snowden had carefully studied what had happened to people before him who had tried to object to national security policies or practices. and snowden did particularly admire tom drake and what drake didn't have and that snowden decided he needed was to provide documentary evidence of what he was saying to reporters. that would force the u.s. government to take on the questions in a substantive way. >> and force the government, he did. coming up, general alexander and his agency are dragged from the shadows of secrecy into the harsh light of public scrutiny. (husband) that's good to know. ♪ ♪ ♪ i've got a to-do list and five acres of fresh air. ♪ top three tools -- hammer, screwdriver, front loader. happiness is a drive-over mower deck. a john deere dealer can teach tractors to anybody. [ don ] in the right hands, an imatch quick-hitch could probably cure most of the world's problems. [ male announcer ] that's

that's such as tom drake and others, that's what snowden would be facing.e would be facing a jail cell from the time he step off the plane here, the plane that john kerry offered him. he would be stepping into handcuffs and he would probably never get out unless the he is pea onnage act is changed to allow a defense of public benefit, public interest in which these matters could be brought up. that's what congress should do and even before that the supreme court should at last rule on those aspects that they are unconstitutional, violations of the first amendment and freedom of press. >> we are going to have to leave it there. it is a fascinating parallel. thank you so much for bringing it full circle. daniel ellsberg, brought up by snowden and then ugsed another example -- as another example by kerry and now your response, thank you so much. a programming note, you can watch the entire nbc news exclusive, the interview inside the mind of edward snowden tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern here on msnbc. coming up next, more on the fallout at the va after secretary

credence to his rendition the narrative that he's not the first who is told the identical story tom drake who jesselyn knows very well basically confronted the same kind of problem and that's repeated throughout the whistleblower regime it is not the case that whistleblowers characteristically leap to go public without trying to work internally they're not reckless people they're conscientious and i can state that i think mr snowden's demeanor gives a special strength to his his narrative there's nothing that looks exaggerated frantic he doesn't use words that are. that display antipathy towards the united states or others and that strengthens the credibility of his entire story and just what do you think as an attorney yourself well actually one of those internal complaints recently surfaced minutes before we went on the air here and again you can kind of see we don't have the underlying e-mail but the response the first sentence of it makes sense that executive orders don't trump statutes but the second sentence is completely nonsensical that regulations may or may not be precedent for

whistleblower in this area is smeared with the idea that they have harmed national security that tom drake was going to have the blood of soldiers on his fans yet in chelsea manning skase for example when it came time to produce a damage assessment during the court martial the u.s. was unable to do so and if you care to fully parse the words that the u.s. uses when it talks about this damage usually they couch it in terms of it might cause some damage in the future and again it's impossible to prove a negative so by giving saying these assertions without any evidence to back it up i don't take it at face value at all and norman i heard you not time then. yes i could unfortunately there's really a track record the track record of lying truckload of lying is not just from n.s.a. and other intelligence agencies but unfortunately also from the u.s. department of justice before edward snowden stepped forward the justice department went to the supreme court and falsely asserted that the a.c.l.u. and other groups had no standing because there was no reason to believe or evidence that they were be

drake. >> i have people coming to me with grave concerns about, "what are we doing, tom? i thought we're supposed to have a warrant. i'm being directed to deploy what's normally foreign intelligence, outward-facing equipment, i'm being now directed to place it on internal networks." >> narrator: at the same time, bill binney and the thinthread team heard that "the program" was using thin thread but stripping out the privacy protections. >> what they're hearing is that the program they designed is in some form being put into use, but without the protections that they had designed in. >> what they did was they got rid of the section of the code that encrypted any of the attributes of u.s. citizens. >> narrator: even ed loomis, who had wanted a more robust approach, was surprised at how far the agency was willing to go. >> i just refused to believe, after all i had been through for 37 years, that all of a sudden things would change and they'd go back to the old ways, back to the early '70s. i didn't believe that they could possibly have just flip-flopped and gone 180 degrees