> I think the circumstantial evidence is quite strong, though.
It's quite mysterious to me why anyone would believe the FBI, an organization that has never been directed by a Democrat in its entire existence, would be politically motivated to tilt the scales toward Democrats. It just doesn't pass the laugh test.
> For some reason, the term "conspiracy theory" is never applied to things which are clear conspiracy theories like the claims about Russian Collusion
The thing about a conspiracy theory is that when it is investigated, and the theory pans out, then it transitions into simply a conspiracy. The claims of Russian Collusion were investigated by Robert Mueller and the Republican-chaired Senate Select Intel Committee, and they found that:
1) Trump's campaign manager met with a Russian spy along with Don Jr. and Jared Kushner at Trump's residence. They discussed an exchange of dirt on Clinton for relaxed Russian relations -- which both materialized. When this meeting was discovered they tried to cover it up, and lied about what they talked about.
2) Trump's campaign manager exchanged internal campaign data with a Russian GRU officer, which helped them target US voters in their psyops campaign.
3) The Russian GRU was responsive to Trump's public invitation to hack Hillary Clinton, and the GRU did hack the DNC. Trump loudly trumpeted those hacked materials during the campaign. Roger Stone, through a backchannel to Assange, had advance notice of the hacked materials and lied about his knowledge to Congress and the FBI, for which he was prosecuted, convicted, and later pardoned by Trump.
4) Trump himself claimed neither he nor his campaign had any contacts with Russians, and no business in Russia whatsoever. In fact, the investigation revealed that during the campaign, Trump was working on a Trump Tower Moscow deal with a penthouse dedicated to Vladimir Putin.
5) In fact, Trump's campaign had hundreds of contacts with Russians and lied about them all, including Jeff Session the attorney general who lied under oath to Congress about his contacts.
6) And finally, Trump obstructed the investigation, and lied about obstructing it. Then his hand-picked attorney general Bill Barr put his finger on the scale in the decision to indict Trump based on that obstruction. Barr subsequently lied about doing so to the public and in court filings. The evidence proving that element was unsealed just last week.
But you don't have to take my word for it. You can read the Mueller Report, Senate Intel Report, the Roger Stone court documents, and the recently released OLC memo. I don't know what you want to call the Trump Campaign working directly with a Russian GRU officer, but that sounds a lot like collusion to me.
As far as the whole thing being a "hoax", the Durham investigation has turned up next to nothing aside from an acquittal, and has gone on longer than the Mueller investigation at this point. It's sad to me so many are clinging onto the "witch hunt" and "hoax" line at this point. In fact, we were right all along, just as we were right about Trump being a aspiring despot who was willing to hang onto power at any cost.