The annoying pattern of silly extrapolation from the primaries to the general election continues.

Rush Limbaugh is saying that John McCain needs Mike Huckabee as his VP to win the South:

Some people think that McCain is going to have to choose Huckabee, because if you look at what McCain won last night… What Huckabee did last night in the South has stunned everybody, because he spent about four bucks, and he just swept through the South.

The real story last night, though, is not that Huckabee won in the South. The story is that McCain didn’t win the South… McCain, for all intents and purposes, is the nominee… The fact that he did not win the South is important, the reason is simple. He’s not strong in the South, and Republicans cannot win the White House, cannot win a presidential race without winning in the South, and McCain demonstrated he can’t do that last night unless he puts the Huckster on the ticket as the veep.

So John McCain is going to lose Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, and Tennessee (the Southern states Huckabee won) in November without him? Please.

Even the New York Times, which rarely fact-checks absurd claims, throws water on this one in an article on Huckabee’s supposed resurgence:

Yet even if [Huckabee] were to do well in Texas, the experts ask, so what? He cannot overtake Mr. McCain in delegates, and he does not necessarily add to his desirability as a vice-presidential candidate, since Texas is likely to vote Republican in the general election, with or without Mr. Huckabee on the ticket. Louisiana, Mississippi and Virginia, also still in play, fall under similar analysis, to varying degrees.

In the Times, Nicholas Kristof makes the same error:

So that raises the obvious question: Who would be the stronger Democratic candidate?

The answer isn’t certain, partly because Barack Obama’s shine could quickly tarnish…

But one clue emerged in Tuesday’s balloting in 14 “red states” that were won by President George W. Bush in 2004. Mr. Obama won nine while Hillary Rodham Clinton won four and is ahead in the fifth.

The Democratic primary electorate in “red states” is not representative of those states. More importantly, look at the “red” states Obama won. Most of them (ie Alabama, Alaska, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, North Dakota, and Utah) are not going to go Democratic no matter who the nominee is.