Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget red

This is a classic case of how far an example can go distorting the original meaning. It is assumed that the original intent of the text must be kept intact in the correct choice. Let us analyze choice by choice.

Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.

A. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A. ------keep it for the time being

B. If the Administration had not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A. -----The original states President's Administration; the choice simply says Administration – IMO this is distinct distortion

C. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, it would have been rated an A. ---Where has gone the ‘his first year in office’? A flagrant distortion apart from the ambiguity of the pronoun ‘it’

D. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on its budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A. ------- just as in the original except for a minor change; keep it for the time being

E. If the President had not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, the administration’s first year in office would have been rated an A. ---- Who lost the vote – the President or the President’s admin? A distinct distortion yet again.

The final choice has to rest on A or D; but I do not see what the great difference is between ‘the budget’ and ‘its budget’in this context . However, if we are fastidious about maintaining the originality, then the choice should go for A

All said and done, if E is the official answer, GOK why.

Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.

A. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.--> illogical.His cannot refer to president's administration.

B. If the Administration had not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.-->his does not have an antecedent.

C. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, it would have been rated an A.--> initially seems correct but its eliminated because it might refer to reduction passage too .

D. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on its budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.-->same reason as A and B.

E. If the President had not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, the Administration's first year in office would have been rated an A.-->bingo !! correct .
Hope my explanation helps !!

I wonder why there is such hair-splitting on the issue. As far as meaning goes, there will be no situation when the president is seen as different from his admin nor has the admin got powers sans the president’s sanction. So I do not see much difference among A, B and D.
However, you can see how horribly each of the choices distorts the original meaning.
1. Keep A, the original content.
2. B. It does not even mention the President. Whose admin is it anyway?
3. Does the pronoun it stand for the package or the administration His first year is totally missing from the context
4. What is the difference between its budget reduction package and the budget reduction passge in D?. Its is good enough.
5. Why is the split between the President and the Administration in E?

Overall, I am afraid this topic takes us nowhere. If we ignore meaning , perhaps any choice other than C may be good enough as all seem to go by the copybook structure of the past subjunctive or the past conditional.

C) Had the President’s Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, it would have been rated an A.

I thought "it" refers to the "president's administration"

Throw some light on option C as why it is wrong.

In my opinion, the Administration is used with the meaning : "a period of government", therefore it can not win or lose vote --> E is correct

There is absolutelly no way to be E the OA. Also, this question doesn't look very GMAT-like.

Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.

A. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.
Correct. No errors whatsoever.
B. If the Administration had not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.
Incorrect. "his" has no antecedent (it cannot be the administration).
C. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, it would have been rated an A.
Incorrect. Meaning changed. It was the president who would have been rated, not the "president's administration".
D. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on its budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.
Incorrect. Meaning changed. The option A. never said that the "budget reduction package" was from the president's administration.
E. If the President had not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, the Administration's first year in office would have been rated an A.
Incorrect. Meaning changed. It was not the president who had lost the vote, it was the administration.

Since the complete sentence is underlined, no need to assume that it's meaningful and the answer should preserve the same meaning.
Coming to the answers, his ,a pronoun can't refer to a possessive noun. so A, D are out. B is obviously incorrect since his refers to administration.
C has a it and it's not clear what it refers to , package or Administration. So left out is E and it's grammatically correct, though If offends few people.



+1 for kudos

Look at this.



‘The Administration’s first year’ is outlandish. Presidents may come and go, but the Administration goes on forever. It has no first or last year. Alternatively, the choice should at least say ‘his first year’. Therefore, we do not know whose administration is it anyway.
However, aside that, can someone say, what this question is trying to test? Is it the use of conditionals, possessive pronoun poison, or any other thing?

Hi,

>>>>> A. Had the President's Administration not lost the vote on the budget reduction package, his first year in office would have been rated an A.--> illogical.His cannot refer to president's administration.

Choice A is not illogical. Only Possesive pronoun can have antecendent in possesive form, in this option, "his" clearly refers to president. Having said that, don't see any issue with choice A.

Letter A is wrong because, president's administration cannot be analogous with his.

A D E are all credible answer choices..
Faulty question.

Posted from my mobile device

B is obviously incorrect, as the pronoun ‘his’ has no noun for it to refer to. C is wrong because ‘it’ is referring to the package when it should be referring to the administration. In both A and D ‘his; should not be referring to the President’s Administration. This means E is the right choice.

+1 .. A and D are the only ones that seem to be near correct. Source of this one please ?

Hello from the GMAT Club VerbalBot!

Thanks to another GMAT Club member, I have just discovered this valuable topic, yet it had no discussion for over a year. I am now bumping it up - doing my job. I think you may find it valuable (esp those replies with Kudos).

Want to see all other topics I dig out? Follow me (click follow button on profile). You will receive a summary of all topics I bump in your profile area as well as via email.