This might be my favorite of @maddow's Steele dossier segments. The Danchenko indictment really destroyed it. Mini-thread:
The segment is titled "More Pieces of Donald Trump Russia Dossier Check Out."
In typical Maddow fashion, she spent 20 minutes dissecting a pretty minor allegation in the dossier: that Russia suddenly recalled its diplomat Mikhail Kalugin because of his involvement in hacking.
In typical Maddow fashion, she spent 20 minutes dissecting a pretty minor allegation in the dossier: that Russia suddenly recalled its diplomat Mikhail Kalugin because of his involvement in hacking.
Maddow asserted that Kalugin was suddenly recalled to Moscow, to everyone's surprise. She cited a McClatchy report that Kalugin was on US govt's radar (a Russian diplomat on our radar, whoa if true).
Maddow overlooked other glaring errors in the dossier about Russia's diplomatic core, such as there being a consulate in Miami (there isn't).
But the Danchenko indictment shows that Kalugin wasn't "suddently" recalled. In fact, a Russian embassy official told Danchenko's source, Chuck Dolan, that Kalugin would be replaced in DC by another diplomat *months before* it happened.
A dossier memo dated Sept. 14, 2016 said Kalugin had been recalled "on short notice." 
But the Danchenko indictment destroys the Steele/Maddow theory. An embassy official told Chuck Dolan on May 31, 2016 that Kalugin would be replaced *in September*. His departure was in the works well *before* media reports of the DNC hack.
The Kalugin allegation was not that significant to the overall dossier, but it was useful for the Resistance at a time when virtually nothing from the dossier could be definitively proved or disproved. Now we know it was also garbage.
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