The main issue (to me) is that it says "Did you
mean: [bold blue link]",
which in this context I think most users would expect to be able to click
and go directly to the article. It should be simple enough to query the page
table for page existence, but perhaps two messages would be better here.
This link is context-specific. If the user comes to Special:Search by
pressing enter (i.e. equivalent to what "Go" used to do), and Did you
mean.. suggests a complete article title, the link will lead directly to
the article. Only if the user is searching (i.e. by pressing the Search
button or "containing....") then it won't.
This behaviour is the relic of the distinction between Search and Go.
However, since the vast majority of users come to Special:Search with
"Go", this link actually does what one would expect. I think the
confusion mainly arises because it is not straightforward to know if one
is in the "Go" or "Search" mode, nor if the suggestion is a whole
article title or not. I wonder how much this actually matters to an
average user that would click on a Did you mean link even before
checking what the suggestion is believing it will magically show more
helpful results (I at least do it in my everyday browsing).
Thus, I would find having two links for what should be one and the same
even more confusing.
Also I believe this is a separate issue from the engine providing
useless suggestions that just lead to other suggestions, which seems to
be the theme of the original post.
r.