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A bit of a tangent, but I'd like to point out this is an excellent example of a real conspiracy that wasn't leaked. So many people on here act like conspiracies are impossible because someone will leak it - clearly not!
I'm not sure I'd consider this a "conspiracy" outside of the most trivial sense of the word as the FBI, and law enforcement in general, tend to be loathe to reveal details on active investigations or even if there is an investigation going on.
So people not revealing they are investigating Hunter Biden and they have his laptop is just standard operating procedure, the same behavior they'd do for essentially any other crime they suspect went or is going on.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=hXjLqhtnIRI
If you're the person that Biden is bragging about ordering the firing of, is this a conspiracy? It sure seems so to me.
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I mean that explains why they didn’t release hunters laptop early, but it doesn’t explain why they decided to lie about it when it came to light.
Did the FBI itself actually lie, or was it people associated with the FBI?
Fair, but the FBI itself was clearly willing to be associated with the lie.
I’m not sure the FBI could announce the laptop was verified on the eve of the election.
Presupposing the whole Russian disinformation thing was done in good faith.
The FBI announcing the laptop was real would be truthful but meddling in an election.
The FBI declining to comment, or just saying ‘no results yet’ would be politically neutral mistruths. But they decided to lie in a partisan manner instead.
The FBI told social media of a general threat of misinformation. I do believe your belief. But you can’t prove the ones issue the warning knew about the laptop being verified and were referring to it. Which means they may have acted in good faith or they were super partisan and made sure to maintain plausible deniability.
The FBI guy at Twitter specifically told them that the laptop was misinformation. You have to be pretty naive to think that he didn't ask the FBI.
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I would say that there's a time component involved. Can something be kept under wraps for some period of time? Probably. Given the involvement of enough people, what is the chance that it eventually leaks out? Probably pretty high. P is a function of both the number of people required and the time since the event; to maximize the chance that you can have a successful conspiracy, keep the former absurdly low (lower than you think); to understand historical events that would have required large groups, just let the latter keep ticking for a while.
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