Acknowledgments
I received a great deal of help and support in pulling together this book. I would like to thank my colleagues Paul Herrnson, Raymond La Raja, Alex Zakaras, Alec Ewald, David Mindich, Garrison Nelson, and the other anonymous reviewers who all read through the manuscript and gave me valuable feedback. I would also like to thank the students at the University of Vermont with whom I have had many great conversations about elections and democracy in the United States, discussions that helped me clarify and flesh out the ideas that went into this book. In particular I would like to single out the students of my class “The 2008 Election” who were forced to read and respond to an earlier version of this manuscript, including Bill Backhaus, Emelie Bailey, Leah Davis, Jason Depatie, Marietou Diouf, Benjamin Guttridge, Michael Lamb, Matthew McKeon, August Melita, Ally Perleoni, Janell Schafer, Brooke Sharpe, Jesse Simmons, and Margaret Walsh. I have had several teaching assistants who have helped me in various direct and indirect ways with this book, including Kensington Moore, Colin MacDonald, Yekaterina Kleyman, Kelsey Aroian, Ally Perleoni, and Claire Chevrier.