After lunch, when we convoyed to the Valley Ho and sat around a Jetsons-style bar table over fizzy drinks, she confided that she was in the “very, very baby stages of some television stuff, just development.” She quickly added, “I would never do a reality show, ever.”

Could a “Meghan McCain Show” be a reasonable future move? “It’s easy to imagine that she could pull it off,” Mr. Felsenthal said. Ms. Shepherd had a still stronger reaction, “I absolutely see Meghan in television. When she comes on and talks she puts the ideologies in practical terms, and she makes it so you understand.” She added, “Meghan will never have to go on ‘Dancing with the Stars.’ ”

Ms. Shepherd was alluding to another female figure in the Republican political scene: Sarah Palin’s daughter Bristol, who is to appear on “Dancing with the Stars” this fall.