A whistleblower may be a courageous truth-teller, a thief, or an attention-seeking narcissist, depending on the circumstances surrounding the leak, two guests with security backgrounds told
Newsmax TV on Friday.
"Not every leaker is a whistleblower," former FBI special agent and supervisor Tanya S. DeGenova, head of a security consulting firm in Boston, told "MidPoint" host Ed Berliner.
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DeGenova said a leaker like former NSA contractor Edward Snowden doesn't merit the term "whistleblower."
"This is a person who violated, really, the Espionage Act, I should say, and we need to deal with these people very swiftly and use everything that the government has in its toolbox to stop this bleeding," she said.
Retired U.S. Air Force Col. Stan L. VanderWerf, a former intelligence analyst and NORAD division chief who today runs a 3-D printing company in Colorado, said that while Snowden should return home from Russia and defend his actions in court, he presents a complicated case.
"I can appreciate that he actually identified spying on American citizens that seems to be taking place," said VanderWerf. "But I tell you it's pretty suspicious to me that he's living in Russia now, and that is a big concern at that point."
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