On the January 3 edition of MSNBC's The Most, host Alison Stewart, in a discussion with Washington Post staff writer Lois Romano, joined ABCNews.com* in citing the website of Internet gossip Matt Drudge, which “suggest[ed] there's going to be this New York Times report that Sen. Hillary Clinton's [D-NY] camp thinks her two biggest contenders here are Sen. [Barack] Obama [D-IL] and former Sen. [John] Edwards [D-NC]” in the 2008 Democratic primary for president.

As Media Matters for America noted, Drudge reported on January 2 that The New York Times was set to publish an article by chief political reporter Adam Nagourney on January 3 indicating that Clinton “believes the threat of his [Obama's] candidacy will diminish as voters learn how inexperienced he is in government and foreign affairs!” According to Drudge, “newsroom sources” at the Times told him that "[e]ditors have placed a story filed by reporter Adam Nagourney in Page One lead positions." The January 3 Times, however, did not publish such an article. Drudge has since updated his story, reporting on January 3: “Publication time: Unknown.” In noting Drudge's report, as with the ABCNews.com article, Stewart did not mention that Drudge revised his claim about when the Times will publish the story after it became clear that Drudge's original reported publication date of January 3 was wrong.

From the January 3 edition of MSNBC's The Most:

STEWART: That is -- that is an excellent point. We were talking this morning, the Drudge Report is suggesting there's going to be this New York Times report that Sen. Hillary Clinton's camp thinks her two biggest contenders here are Senator Obama and former Senator Edwards. Edwards vetted last time around, and Senator Obama really has a long road ahead of him in terms of digging up his past, doesn't he?

ROMANO: He does, and you know, one good analogy would be to take a look at Howard Dean at this time. I mean, he was getting unsurpassed support from first-time involvers -- I mean, people who hadn't voted. I mean, he was just exciting people. And as the campaign wore on, he didn't wear as well. I mean, he was shown to have a short fuse. He -- and we all remember the scene in Iowa when he started screaming when he lost. And so, that's the kind of things -- you know, voters are not going to be totally focused on whether he has experience or not, although that's going to be somewhat of an issue, but I think they're going to look at how he comports himself over these next two years.

*The link to the online version of the ABCNews.com article appears to no longer work.

UPDATE: The New York Times has posted the article in question here.