Comment by eadz

This is an important article and adds some real context to Washington Post's editorial. This quote sums it up.

  But still, if the Post editorial page editors now want to
  denounce these revelations, and even call for the 
  imprisonment of their paper’s own source on this ground,
  then they should at least have the courage to acknowledge
  that it was The Washington Post — not Edward Snowden — who
  made the editorial and institutional choice to expose those
  programs to the public.

The Washington Post's editors decided these stories were in the public interest and should be published, not Snowden.