Will Mississippi ever produce a serious presidential candidate?

Haley Barbour on Monday announced he would not seek the Republican nomination for president. He had hinted for months that he would run, visiting early primary states. Iowa, South Carolina and New Hampshire. Early polling had him near the bottom of possible Republican challengers to the first black president in the nation’s history, Barack Obama.

Even winning the nomination would have been a monumental effort. Barbour is portly, albeit a bit less than when he began his efforts earlier this year. He speaks with a deep Southern drawl. He’s white. And he is from Mississippi. On the national level, add those up and it equals a non-starter.

What a shame.

Barbour has been a more-than-competent governor for the past seven years. He became the face of recovery during Hurricane Katrina. On the one-year anniversary, standing on the Gulf Coast, Barbour said, “Mississippians aren’t into victimhood. Our people got knocked down flat. The next day they got up, hitched up their britches and went to work.” He led.

As governor, he attracted industries to the state and has worked with the Legislature in crafting a balanced budget. His “aw-shucks” demeanor aside, Barbour could always get things done.

Washington, D.C., seems like the perfect place, in theory, for someone who gets things done. But America is not ready for someone who looks like Barbour, speaks like Barbour, or is from this state. Surveys have shown much of the country has a perception of this state — fattest, dumbest and most racially intolerant. Winning over those states would be climbing Mount Everest wearing shorts, a T-shirt and flip-flops.

One day, a Mississippian might rise to the highest office in the land. We simply don’t think it will be soon as perception trumps reality.

Haley Barbour was the best shot in many, many years of a Mississippian ending that perception. It got him almost to May — 17 months before the election.

William Faulkner, another Mississippian, said it best: “The past isn’t dead; it isn’t even past.” How unfortunate.