Back in October, in one of the debates for Republican presidential candidates, Mike Huckabee bragged that of the "56 brave people" who signed the Declaration of Independence, "most...were clergymen." As it turns out, Huckabee didn't know what he was talking about -- only one of the 56 was an active minister at the time. Huckabee later conceded his mistake.

Apparently, his new campaign chairman, Ed Rollins, missed the incident two months ago, because he offered a similar argument yesterday on CNN. (via Michael D.)

DOBBS: I have never, perhaps you have, but never in my experience have I seen so many candidates talking about God in a primary campaign and in a general election, I presume and it will remain there. How comfortable are you with that and is it appropriate for God to be in religion and faith to be this prominent in a secular campaign for president?

ROLLINS: You go back to the signing of the Constitution I think 26 of the people that signed it were ministers.

Granted, we've already seen plenty of more egregious errors of fact and judgment from the Huckabee campaign, but if they're going to keep throwing around these numbers, we might as well set the historical record straight.

There were 40 signers of the U.S. Constitution, and one -- not 26 -- was a minister.

Besides the response was a bit of a non-sequitur anyway -- the question was about the role of near-constant religious rhetoric in a presidential campaign. Rollins' ignorance of history is amusing, but it would have been far more helpful if he at least tried to answer a reasonable question.