The value of an HN comment is the expected value of its future subthread—i.e. itself, plus the sum of the probability distribution of the responses it may receive.
In this case the EV of your post was negative: first because it brought in a partisan stunt that was still hot from the news of the moment; second by framing it one-sidedly ("barged into...without authorization...such a problem"); third by linking to a political source that one side is overwhelmingly likely to agree with and the other side to be unimpressed or offended by.
You're right that the flamewar was more in the responses to your comment than in your comment itself, but that's true of most flamewars. Flames get hotter as they spread. From a fire prevention point of view, the issue isn't where the fire burned hottest but where it started.
By the way, there are some deeper, interesting issues with this 'expected value' model of comments. It implies that commenters are in some sense responsible for the behavior of others and not just what they they themselves post. That's weird. And it implies that one needs to consider not just one's own post, but future replies—also weird. Yet it is the model that works the best in practice.