In case you are unfamiliar with old movie tunes, the title is a punnish take on the song “Put the Blame on Mame” sung by Rita Hayworth in the Movie Gilda. Aw gee, I wish I didn’t have to ‘splain these things, but few are as nerdish as me, so…there you have it.

Now that that’s out of the way, we need to talk about Edward Snowden. Yes, the latest leaker. Picture, please!

Yes, little Edward…carefully plans out giving information that frankly isn’t that new or original to the Washington Post and simultaneously to the British, liberal newspaper The Guardian. I first heard about the story through the Guardian, and Glenn Greenwald’s name was mentioned as the journalist who broke the story.

Organized media – what is it Sarah puckishly calls it – lamestream media? Organized media seemed to focus on two elements of the story: first that it’s terrible that the government is spying on all of us using a software program called PRISM, and second – and not too far behind – that Little Edward was a high school dropout. Congressmen and women pretend to be outraged about the spying, but the Obamites rubbed their bellies and put them back to sleep with a couple of briefings. So no big deal there…the “American Public” quickly polled on the subject said yes, it was a shame that the government is spying on somebody (certainly not them individually!) but if it keeps us safe, well then they support it. OK, no issue there. So what’s left? A HIGH SCHOOL DROPOUT is making a six figure salary working for a government contractor and he gets access to all these secrets. There, at last is a story. Whew! The news cycle simply must be fed.

High school dropout, earning somewhere between $122k (per Booze, Allan, his now-former employer) and $200k (per Little Edward). Yes, Booze Hamilton fired little Edward over this. Golly! Reminds me of that line from Nine to Five, shared by Lily Tomlin, AKA Violet Newstead: “I killed the boss. You think they won’t fire me for a thing like that?”

Back to the money. No matter who’s telling the truth, it’s a bunch of money. To do what? He’s been labeled an IT administrator. Well, that could be the guy who comes to your office, boorishly shouts at you to “Move”, sits in your chair, hits the keyboard a dozen times and fixes whatever you were complaining about. Maybe Little Edward did more than that. I expect that Little Edward was a database administrator: hence his ability to access all that info. D/B admins are hard to find and should be paid well (note to my brother John: see??!!)

Little Eddie undoubtedly had a “top secret” clearance, and why not? He’d never done anything bad before this. So he gets a little bit of info, and becomes a ‘hero’ to somebody by telling all of us about it.

OK – where am I going with this? In a weird sort of way, maybe Little Edward is like those guys that dress up in black outfits, take guns and ammo to a public place, start shooting and then either commit suicide themselves or get shot by the police who eventually arrive to take him out. This is his 15 minutes of fame. Maybe Ed is somebody who thought he was living a charmed life making all that dough with so little effort, but needed to make the big time by becoming a martyr for a delusional cause.

Or maybe there’s another potential explanation (of course there is – you should know by now the first suggestions are always throw-away lines.) I think Little Edward is an example of the computer nerd archetype (CNA). He’s the geek who’s shunned by nearly everybody at school. But he translates that to his reality: he’s too much of a genius to go to school. So he sleeps all day and tap on keyboard keys all night. Maybe he’s a little autistic; into Japanese anime; he’s Sheldon on The Big Bang Theory (what a dumb show…really, I don’t watch it – honestly I don’t…) Zilch for social skills, lives on Ramen noodles, plays Minecraft for hours with his “on-line” friends and thinks he’s been shortchanged in life because of his unmistakeable yet unrecognized genius. I believe we’ve got him I.D.’d.

So how does this tie back to the title? I guess it’s a warning to all you Mothers out there (real Moms: I’m not using the epithetical label here). If you have a son or daughter who fits this archetype, but are not yet old enough to have fully blossomed into Little Ed, take that computer and toss it out the window. Lock him or her up for a week with sensory deprivation (no on-line access) until he or she promises to give it all up. Otherwise, at the end of the day, or when the smoke clears, or whatever summing-up platitude you want to use, you’ll be blamed for not raising Little Edward or Baby Edwina properly. Act now, or be prepared to take the rap!

So, again to say it succintly, using a musical metaphor: Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be cowboys or CNAs (Computer Nerd Archetypes).