Someone check to see if there is ice skating happening in Hades, because for once I actually agree with former Attorney General Eric Holder.

While the world was focused on who’s to blame for the death of a gorilla in a Cincinnati zoo, Holder used a CNN/University of Chicago podcast to claim that Edward Snowden performed a “public service” by shedding light upon National Security Administration surveillance techniques. “We can certainly argue about the way in which Snowden did what he did, but I think that he actually performed a public service by raising the debate that we engaged in and by the changes that we made,” he said on the “Axe Files.”

But that’s the extent of the Holder shoutout. He continued,

“He harmed American interests. I know there are ways in which certain of our agents were put at risk, relationships with other countries were harmed, our ability to keep the American people safe was compromised. There were all kinds of re-dos that had to be put in place as a result of what he did, and while those things were being done we were blind in certain really critical areas. So what he did was not without consequence.”

Holder is also not offering Snowden any carte blanche forgiveness. He says he should return to the United States to face the consequences of his mass leaking of classified information.

“I think that he’s got to make a decision. He’s broken the law in my view. He needs to get lawyers, come on back, and decide, see what he wants to do: Go to trial, try to cut a deal. I think there has to be a consequence for what he has done.”

Snowden, for his part, seemed amused. Safely ensconced in his asylum in Russia, he tweeted:

2013: It's treason!
2014: Maybe not, but it was reckless
2015: Still, technically it was unlawful
2016: It was a public service but
2017:

— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) May 30, 2016

Holder is correct; Snowden did play an important role in revealing the depths to which the NSA was able to pry into the lives of average Americans. But beyond that, Snowden is nothing more than a high tech traitor to the nation, willing to subvert her security when he released a minimum of 50,000 to as much as 1.7 million NSA documents, most of which, as General Martin Dempsey said in 2014, “had nothing to do with exposing government oversight of domestic activities. The vast majority of those were related to our military capabilities, operations, tactics, techniques and procedures.”

As someone with a close family member serving as a military officer in a highly secretive service, I was alarmed and infuriated. How dare he endanger the life of my loved one to serve his agenda! I was also disgusted at the flagrant manner in which he treated security clearance.

In the late 1980’s my husband worked for a well-known defense contractor in engineering support. As a prerequisite to working in what was informally known as the “black hole,” he had to obtain security clearance. This took weeks in the pre-internet age, consisting of much paperwork and interviews with the FBI. One of his colleagues nearly did not obtain clearance, as his wife was a Mexican national. To further complicate his dilemma, this man approached his interview with the no-nonsense FBI members with a flippant attitude. They didn’t appreciate his humor.

My husband did obtain his clearance, and he never once revealed to me what projects he observed. Occasionally he would have nightmares about leaving the office with a briefcase containing classified material. It wasn’t until after many years had passed that he would tell me when he recognized some military hardware in a news story that he had part in development years earlier. Unlike Snowden, my husband took his security clearance seriously, and had great respect for the military force he was supporting as a civilian.

The more I heard about Edward Snowden, the more appalled I became at him and his devotees who labeled him a “hero.” Here was a man who was a close colleague of the anti-American journalist Glenn Greenwald, a self-hating Jew who despised Israel, and a man of whom Alan Dershowitz said ‘never met a terrorist he didn’t like.’ Greenwald has also praised another document leaker and traitor Bradley Manning, now serving time in Leavenworth, as a “hero who deserves a medal.”

Remember the old adage, that ‘you’re known by the company you keep?’ Some nice company Snowden keeps.

Coincidentally at the time the Snowden news broke, I was reading the biography of German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer entitled Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas. Both Snowden and Bonhoeffer worked against their governments, but the difference between them is stark. Bonhoeffer actively and openly established his “Confessing Church” in the 1930’s in direct defiance to the Nazis. In 1939 he returned from a trip to New York City to join the political resistance after World War II broke out, despite pleas from his parents to remain in the safety of America. He never fled, never returned to New York or to England where he had previously established friendships. He was executed in 1945 for his role in resistance to the Nazis.

Contrast Bonhoeffer with Edward Snowden. Snowden fled to Russia, where he enjoys asylum today. He refuses to return to the United States to make his case or to face charges, claiming that he wouldn’t receive a “fair trial.” Snowden a hero? More like a coward. If he truly believes in the rightness of his cause, why is he not willing to boldly proclaim it in America?

Eric Holder is correct: while it was a good thing that Snowden did reveal the overreach by the NSA, he compromised our foreign relations, our military, our agents, and our overall security. I will never view him as a hero.