The political career of U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, one of five women elected to the U.S. Senate in 1992's so-called Year of the Woman, has been marked by a series of historic firsts. The first female member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Feinstein became the first woman mayor of San Francisco in 1978. In 1992, she won a special election to the U.S. Senate, and she was reelected in 1994, 2000, and 2006. Feinstein was the first woman to serve on the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee and the first woman to chair the Senate Rules Committee and Senate Intelligence Committee. At seventy-six years old in 2009, Feinstein was rumored to be considering a run for governor of the state of California in 2010.

As chair of the Senate Rules Committee in the 110th Congress, Feinstein also became the first woman to chair the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies for the January 20, 2009, inauguration of Barack Obama as the first African American president of the United States. On perhaps one of the most visible days of her thirty-nine-year political career, she called the ceremony to order, delivered welcoming remarks, and served as emcee for the event.

Despite her political success and longevity, Feinstein also illustrates the double bind that women politicians face in their media coverage, television advertising, and Web sites in communicating an image that is tough but caring.