These were our most widely read posts of 2016

Nicole Kirby looks over results during a statewide presidential election recount in Milwaukee on Dec. 1. (Morry Gash/Associated Press)

As we did in 2014 and 2015, we have put together this quick recap of our most-read posts in the past year.

“Bill O’Reilly will flee to Ireland if Sanders is elected. He’s in for a shock.” Our resident Irishman Henry Farrell laid out what O’Reilly could expect: “From the perspective of its Western European neighbors, Ireland is a small, market-friendly, right-of-center country. But from the perspective of American conservatism, Ireland looks like a hellhole of socialism.”

“Everything you need to know about how the presidential primary works.” Joshua Putnam of the excellent Frontloading HQ blog provided this master explainer, which was also in our top posts of 2015.

“These 6 charts show how much sexism Hillary Clinton faces on Twitter.” Rebekah Tromble and Dirk Hovy analyzing more than  100,000 tweets from the Democratic primary to identify how differently Bernie Sanders and Clinton were treated on Twitter.

“What do ordinary citizens in the Arab world really think about ISIS?” Mark Tessler, Michael Robbins and Amaney Jamal summarized polling data from Tunisia, Jordan, Palestine, Algeria and Morocco and conclude: “It is clear, overall, that there is very little support for the Islamic State among these five Arab publics.”

“New ranking of U.S. presidents puts Lincoln at No. 1, Obama at 18; Kennedy judged most overrated.” This post by Brandon Rottinghaus and Justin Vaughn was our third-most-trafficked post in 2015.

“Everything you need to know about delegate math in the presidential primary.” Josh Putnam makes another appearance, in an interview with me where he explains the complex arithmetic of turning primary and caucus outcomes into convention delegates.

“Hillary Clinton will gain votes after Election Night. Here’s why.” Charles Stewart III and Edward B. Foley explained the logistics of vote counting and correctly predicted that the “overtime” ballots would add to Clinton’s vote count. It has only increased since Nov. 8.

“A new poll shows 52% of Republicans actually think Trump won the popular vote.” On the eve of the electoral college vote, Eric Oliver and Thomas Wood reported a pretty striking result. Once again, partisan bias reigns supreme.

“The Wisconsin recount may have a surprise in store after all.” Our most widely read post of the year is by Charles Stewart III (once again), Stephen Ansolabehere, Barry C. Burden  and Kenneth R. Mayer. The surprise was one few would expect given all the criticism of voting machines: the machines actually count more accurately.

Thanks to everyone for reading. See you in 2017.