Gary Wasser­man was a Pro­fes­sor of Gov­ern­ment at George­town Uni­ver­si­ty in Qatar for eight years. He has writ­ten for The Wash­ing­ton Post, For­eign Pol­i­cy, Polit­i­cal Sci­ence Quar­ter­ly, and The Chron­i­cle of High­er Edu­ca­tion. He worked as a Wash­ing­ton com­mu­ni­ca­tions con­sul­tant, and taught at Johns Hop­kins SAIS in Chi­na, Colum­bia Uni­ver­si­ty and Medgar Evers Col­lege. His book, The Basics of Amer­i­can Pol­i­tics, is in its 15th edition.