In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart

yes these two are modifiers but they do not need to be parallel . in deciding the parallelism in a construction "X over Y" ,X and Y need to be parallel------>here "conservative incumbents" is parallel to "upstart mavericks" , having said this the construction in E is superior to the construction in A

A. In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts - > In electing is wrong usage here .

B. In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted - > In electing is wrong usage here .
C. By electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potential influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement, conflicting - > i went with thinking potential influential sounds weird
A B AND C elimintad

D. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted
E. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts

i chose d over E , which is wrong ; Like my understanding here is i should have chosen E as the whole sentence is in present tense so E is correct . or is there any other reason ;

In cases of dilemmas such as choosing whether this or that, the standard diction is ‘rather than’, but not ‘instead of’. The OA seems to think otherwise

Why the verb "conflicted" is wrong? why could not be in the past? "in the past, stay in the past..."

D. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted----When we say ‘conflicted’, it may lead to infer that the movement is not any more conflicting. Then the context of comparing between the conservatives and the modernists becomes irrelevant. We can’t hang on to the past event because the elections are in the present.

Is the use of instead of correct ? i thought Gmat use to avoid it ;

I chose 'A' simply because I wanted to avoid 'instead of'.

Instead of vs Rather than - Then in most cases in GMAT - Rather Than is preferred.

Instead of (the two words together) is only a preposition and can introduce only a phrase.

In this sentence, both d and e options use instead of and the usage is correct.

hi,
it is not that the GMAT completely avoids 'instead of'.....
instead of and rather than have specific usages and more than often 'rather than' is used..
1) instead of will always have a noun on other side of 'of', rather than can take verbs in parallel..
2) 'instead of' is used more as a replacement and rather than may show preference of something over something else..

so...I encountered a question earlier in which someone explained that there is no significant difference between "in" and "by" when such examples are present. Now I see that "in" is incorrect. SO who is correct though? I was struggling between A and E.

We can eliminate B and D because the movement still conflicts.
C - have rejected a modernist movement by conflicting??? no! conflicting is an ing modifier that modifies the preceded clause. this is incorrect.
I chose E, because by electing conservative incumbents WITH YEARS OF GVT EXPERIENCE is better than CONSERVATIVE INCUMBENTS GOVERNING FOR YEARS.
voters preferred conservative guys with experience to mavericks. By choosing so, they have rejected a modernist movement.

In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts with their conventional beliefs.

A. In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts
B. In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted
C. By electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potential influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement, conflicting
D. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted
E. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts



Here the main split is between In electing A over B vs. By electing A instead of B - the second one is idiomatically correct and direct.
Eliminate A and B. C has meaning issue - conflicting implies that swing voters are conflicting with their conventional beliefs - Not a great meaning.

B/w D and E, E is better, having a resent tense, as already explained by daagh

Great Q.
Thanks.

my Concern is that years of government experience may not be the same as governing experience, hence distorting the meaning.

One can work for the government with out holding a position that makes them equally new to being elected

I'd let go of the notion that you have to preserve the meaning of the original sentence. Keep in mind, if the phrasing/grammar of the original sentence creates an illogical or ambiguous meaning, you MUST change the meaning of the original! There's nothing in the rules that say to preserve the meaning of the original - your job is to "Choose the answer that produces the most effective sentence; this answer should be clear and exact, without awkwardness, ambiguity, redundancy, or grammatical error." (courtesy mba.com)

"With governing experience" in (D) and (E) isn't the exact same meaning as "who have governed," which is *probably* the intended meaning of (A). (But note that (A) doesn't quite say that - "governing" is strangely in the present tense when "for many years" calls for a longer time period...the exact wording isn't a crystal clear meaning in and of itself). But "with governing experience" isn't illogical at all - it still shows that voters are choosing older and more experienced over fresh "modernist" movement candidates. And "with governing experience" works better with establishing a logical timeline and making absolutely clear that it's modifying "incumbents" so the correct answer modifier has advantages over the original. The meaning is slightly different, but fits perfectly well with a logical meaning for the sentence.

In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts with their conventional beliefs.

A. In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts

B. In electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted

C. By electing conservative incumbents governing for years over upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potential influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement, conflicting
", + verb-ing" modifier modifies the previous clause by either showing the HOW-aspect or reflecting the result of the previous clause.
In this case, it does NONE.

D. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicted

The action of conflict completed in the PAST.
How could something, which existed in the PAST, affect the things happening in the PRESENT? - something: conflict
Look at this way:

Why would the voters reject modernist movement, which had its conflicts in the PAST, in the PRESENT?
It does NOT showcase the correct and intended timelines of the happenings.

E. By electing conservative incumbents with years of government experience instead of upstart mavericks who appeal to younger voters, potentially influential swing voters have rejected a modernist movement that conflicts

The Champ!

KAPLAN OFFICIAL EXPLANATION

Read the Original Sentence Carefully, Looking for Errors:

The underlined portion is long and requires careful examination. We find it confusing, and see that part of the confusion stems from the use of the verb "governing." This form of the verb makes no sense. The sentence has to be 100 percent clear. We know the correct answer will resolve the problem of the verb "governing" and will express the ideas clearly.

Scan and Group the Answer Choices:

The problem verb "governing" appears in choices (A), (B), and (C), so we can eliminate them. Now we need to read each remaining choice carefully, hunting for both a resolution of the verb "governing" and correct grammar.

Eliminate Choices Until Only One Remains:

The remaining choices, (D) and (E), both eliminate the problem with the verb "governing," using instead "with years of government experience." However, choice (D) introduces a new verb error with the use of the past tense "conflicted." Choice (E) corrects the problem with the verb "governing" and introduces no new errors. Thus, Answer Choice (E) is correct.

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