2003 in Review: Which Articles on HNN Drew the Most Comments?

Over the course of the last year readers posted more than 20,000 comments on the articles published by HNN. Which articles drew the most responses?

Unsurprisingly, it was an HNN Poll on Iraq which inspired the most comments, more than 400 in all. The poll was posted on March 19, the day the war began. Readers, styling themselves with a panoply of names from the graveyard of ancient history--from Herodotus to Suetonius--argued about the merits of the war, usually fervently. One poster, anti-war, assailed a pro-war reader for " comfortably advocating war [from home in Arizona] whilst millions suffer the pounding of missiles in cities, the invasion of their villages and the horrors of war we all know and I shan't detail." Another anti-war commentator averred: "American democracy flourished for two centuries without Iraqi oil. We still don't need it now. The power generated by Abe Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt spinning in their graves will be more than sufficient to juice up fuel cells in SUVs from sea to shining sea for years to come."

The article that drew the second highest number of posters--377--concerned a little-known brawl taking place in Alabama, where the head of the Museum of Mobile came under attack after he denounced Gods and Generals on the website of the Southern Poverty Law Center. His job in jeopardy, historians rallied to defend his First Amendment rights. Confronted with adverse public attention, Mobile city officials backed off.

Coming in third was Clayton Cramer's article, "What Clayton Cramer Saw and (Nearly) Everyone Else Missed," an explanation of Cramer's early detective work uncovering the flaws in Michael Bellesiles's book, Arming America. The titles posters gave to their comments suggests the broad range of analyses the article inspired:

• "The underemphasized legal and historical legacy of fraudulent historical research"
• "Oh , it's much worse than that"
• "Cramer is a stooge for NRA propaganda"

Fourth on HNN's list was Derek Catsam's "Bush Officials Are Flunking Anti-Terrorism," which was published earlier this month. The tone of the responses can be gleaned from one representative comment:

I was going to thank you for the backhanded compliment you offered earlier in this discussion. But I think I'll just let it pass, instead, because if I try to say anything after your last note, it won't come out nicely.

Good day.

Fifth was another HNN Poll: "Is It 'Worse than Watergate'?" which concerned Paul Krugman's observation that"the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history." One reader, since bounced from HNN for an uncivil tongue, asked, "Do All the Mentally Ill Visit HNN Every Day?" For once, no one bothered to respond to his cavil.

Sixth was "The Report on European Anti-Semitism that an EU Group Decided Not to Publish," which, predictably, was a lightning rod for controversy, as nearly all articles concerning Judaism have proved to be on HNN. Appended at the end was a comment to which all posters could agree: "Let's have some common sense around here, please," though of course nobody could agree on what constitutes common sense.

Seventh was P.M. Carpenter's recent column, "Why Liberals Are Angry," which ended on this defiant note:

In their rush to political supremacy, conservative strategists such as [Paul] Weyrich and [Terry] Dolan forgot a basic law of human behavior: Even the intimidated, the vanquished, will take bullying just so long. In time they'll get mad and push back. In time they'll explode.

Paul Weyrich forgot, that is, until the recent avalanche of published liberal anger triggered a wake-up call. “Republicans had better worry,” he acknowledged a just few days ago. “Angry people are motivated to get out to vote.”

He oughta' know.

Eighth was Juan Cole's recent reflections on the capture of Saddam Hussein, which quickly inspired a debate about President Bush's handling of the Iraq war.

Ninth on the list was another HNN Poll, "What Does Arnold's Victory Mean?"

Rounding out the list at number ten was an article which mined the same deep veins as P.M. Carpenter's column above: Dave Johnson's "Who's Behind the Attack on Liberal Professors?" which appeared last February.

What these numbers mean is obvious in some ways, unobvious in others. On the obvious scale is the observation that HNN readers like to talk about politics (the subject of five of the ten articles on the list). Also obvious is that anti-Semitism is a big draw. Like Americans generally HNN readers are also intensely interested in the wars the Bush administration has fought.

More subtle are the differences between HNN readers and Americans generally. HNN readers do not seem obsessed with things Kennedy, though many articles concerned hot-button issues such as Kennedy's girlfriends and drug use. HNN readers also seemed less interested than Americans generally in sex. Even the articles about gay rights generated fewer responses than one might have guessed they would.

But in one respect HNN readers are very much like the society at large. Just as Americans generally say they are sick and tired of partisanship, it is the partisan articles that drew the greatest response. Articles which took an even-handed approach (say almost any article in the History Q & A department) drew almost no response.

Note: Most HNN readers choose not to comment on articles. Thus, some articles which drew large numbers of readers do not appear on this list. And some articles inspire a small handful of readers to submit multiple postings.

TOP 20 ARTICLES ON HNN WHICH DREW THE MOST RESPONSES FROM READERS