In response to an FT article by Geoff Dyer on 20th May 2015, entitled 'Rand Paul launches bid to block NSA surveillance programme'
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7bc294fa-ff33-11e4-84b2-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz3akVDAP5g
There is nothing patriotic about the Patriot Act. I suspect Thomas Jefferson would've described it as the King George Act.
Edward Snowden's actions are a more faithful expression of the letter and the spirit of the constitution than anything that has come out of the Washington asylum for decades.
The US is becoming the thing it overthrew - e.g. taxing citizens who live abroad and don't benefit from it's services, fomenting and intervening in conflicts all over the world, attempting to hold down any rising power that it sees as a threat. Washington doesn't get irony.