David Brooks: GOP Senator Groped Me

New York Times columnist David Brooks's career has taught him that the most powerful politicians are a bunch of "emotional freaks" prone to invading personal space, Think Progress reports. "I sat next to a Republican senator once at dinner and he had his hand on my inner thigh the whole time," Brooks recalled on MSNBC yesterday. "I was like, ehh, get me out of here."

Successful politicians are "not that great in normal human relationships," Brooks says.  "They’re lonely. They reach out. I’ve spoken to a lot of young women who are Senate staffers and they’ll have these middle age guys who are sort of in the middle of a mid-life crisis. Emotionally needy, they don’t know how to do it and sort of like these St. Bernards drooling everywhere." (More David Brooks stories.)