For some time now, female Republican leaders like Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann have captured the media spotlight while more Democratic women seem to have faded into the woodwork. It’s not a state of affairs feminist groups want to acknowledge, of course, as I learned when I first wrote about it two months ago. But it is apparent that the progress of women in public life in the United States has in at least some spheres come to a screeching stall.

Over all, left and right, the picture is not encouraging. Last year, for the first time in three decades, the percentage of women in Congress dropped. This year, women hold 89 of 535 seats (16 percent) in the U.S. Congress; 17 of those seats are in the Senate and 72 in the House of Representatives. Perhaps more stunning, the United States has only six female governors, four Republicans and two Democrats.

None of those numbers sit well with Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York, a Democrat who has now made it her mission to stand at the forefront of women’s issues in all aspects of life — from abortion to national security and economic concerns. “I have been very troubled” about the slowdown in women’s participation in public life, she told me, and that was why she introduced a national campaign, called Off the Sidelines, to fire them up.