What about Gephardt?

RealClearPolitics has posted a lineup of columns today that includes several on the domestic political landscape and the Democratic field of presidential candidates. William Safire’s column on the interest of the Democratic powers-that-be in stopping Dean sounds canny and rings true to me, but fails to explain why those powers have not turned to Richard Gephardt.
Gephardt seems to me a highly plausible candidate and the likely alternative to Dean. John Podhoretz seems to suggest as much in an interesting column that is not included in today’s RCP lineup (at least at the moment).
As Deacon noted yesterday, Tom Bevan of RCP himself observed Gephardt’s potential strength as a candidate who “gets it.” Podhoretz adds that Gephardt’s continuing support for the war has not disabled him as a candidate for the Democratic nomination. Are we missing something here?
Following up on the Pew survey results on voter party identification that we wrote about over the weekend, Byron York meditates on the implications in his column “How Bush will likely beat his 537-vote landslide.”