Book excerpt: This is a book about present-day United States senators, who they are, how they behave, and why they behave the way they do. It is not an "inside story" of the Senate, at least not in the lurid, "now it can be told" tradition. It is neither an attack nor a defense of the chamber and its ways. It is merely a description and an explanation. This book is based largely upon interviews with United States senators, Senate staff members, lobbyists, and Washington journalists. - Preface.