I believe you are correct on most of what you wrote. I think this has been the plan for years.
As I've said many times, the question wasn't "why doesn't he release it" as much as "why would he release it"?
This game has kept True Believers tied to pixels and genealogy records instead of spreading the word of his destructive activities to those voters who wouldn't otherwise hear it. This game has marginalized conservatives, as the broad brush is used to paint us all as kooks.
And what has it hurt him? Those who didn't believe the COLB weren't his supporters anyway.
That "$2 million to keep it secret" was a bogus number, anyway, since it included all legal-services expenditures and the three dozen pages of defense filings didn't cost very much at all.
This ace up his sleeve could be pulled at any time. Now it has not only made many people look like fools (even if the thing were a fake) and given cover to The Zero's recent power grabs (by grabbing news coverage), but it has boosted the false-flag spoiler campaign of Donald "Perot" Trump.
It's sad to see conservatives get outplayed in the game of chess, but it's not like there wasn't plenty of warning.
You can see how much the WH loves this circus by the document they released. If they had wanted to truly forge something, surely they could have edited the bitmap, or run it through a scanner to get the chromatic effects right, or made sure there weren't layers left in, etc...this isn't rocket surgery. This is either unedited, or they want the controversy to continue, or--most likely--both.
This reminds me of a show I watched recently, “Cats and Dogs.” One cat was behind the steering wheel. Other cats were at the pedals. “Breaks! Gas! Breaks! Gas! You idiots! Get off the road, you lunatics!”
Yeah, we have hysterical “leaders” screaming their heads off — “You idiots!” to a bunch of normal people. Demcrats laughing at us? Of course. Human nature is what it is, and “leaders” have no power to stop people from being curious. It’s the internal squabbling that makes us look like idiots. We need to EASE on the gas. And frankly, more people need to drive their own cars rather than shout commands at others.