Our Worst Meghan McCain Nightmare Could Be Near

John McCain’s daughter has not had an easy time hosting our favorite morning show, The View. Now, feeling “exhausted” and like a “caged animal” on the ABC show, Meghan might not return next season, the Daily Beast reported on Wednesday.

One “knowledgeable source” told the site McCain is “defeated” by frequently being the lone View co-host defending conservatism on the show and clashing with her more liberal colleagues on the air. “It’s getting to the point where it’s not worth the emotional toll every week,” a “McCain pal” also told the site.

The Beast, along with many other juicy details, also got this less-than-reassuring comment from a top producer on the show:

“We don’t want people to attack Meghan. We’re happy to have Meghan there,” Hilary Estey McLoughlin, the show’s senior executive producer, told The Daily Beast. “I think she does want to be there. I think she wants to be on the show. She realizes it’s a very good platform for her and we love having her there. I feel like she will come back.”

However, as McLoughlin acknowledged, “these stories don’t seem to go away.”

Among those “stories” was a recent Daily Mail story about how morale on the show soared when McCain was out sick with anonymous sources saying her co-hosts have had just about enough of her “manic” grandstanding.

Interestingly enough, McLoughlin was eager to put the idea that McCain’s co-hosts are seeding those damaging stories about her to rest:

“I certainly don’t think it’s someone on our show. I don’t think it’s one of the hosts,” McLoughlin said about the cascade of damaging stories. “I don’t think that someone who is working there today is doing this… I don’t think Sunny is the leak. I don’t. I don’t think anyone who is working on the show could be that overtly doing something that’s potentially problematic for their own careers.

Although, as the Beast makes clear, Sunny Hostin clearly doesn’t mind badmouthing McCain all over town, including to her friends. Per the site:

A close friend of McCain’s, who asked not to be further identified, recounted that Hostin spoke to her at two different social occasions—a book party and an engagement party—about McCain’s alleged anti-social behavior at The View.

“Knowing how close I am to Meghan, she starts talking shit about Meghan to me,” this person said, adding that she promptly relayed Hostin’s comments to McCain. “She said ‘Meghan’s not doing well,’ and then she shakes her head. And she’s, like, feigning concern. ‘She doesn’t talk to anyone… She can’t handle the pressure… She’s condescending about her grieving for her father… Meghan’s not handling this well.’”

What can I say but: savage!!

Is this sudden story about McCain’s plight a cry for help? An opening launch in contract negotiations? An airing of grievances on the way out? Time will tell. A gullible person might be inclined to feel sympathy for McCain’s lot on the show, where, according to the Beast, she’s reportedly earning just under a million dollars a year, to spew nonsense and make almost every issue of the day about herself. But no matter what happens—View or no View—McCain will be just fine. But it’s the rest of us—facing a world where we can’t hear the nepotism case’s daily musings—that I worry about.