The recently announced dissolution of the Freedom Party, a major

Question

The recently announced dissolution of the Freedom Party, a major national political party, will not benefit the one other major national political party, the Liberty Party. It will, however, help third parties, including the Workers Party, who will now take more votes away from the Liberty Party in the upcoming national presidential race than would have been taken by the Freedom Party, had it not been dissolved.

Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the claim made in the last sentence above?

A. Name recognition is a better predictor of a political party's success than how well its positions match with public opinion.

B. Most voters had considered the Freedom Party and the Liberty Party to have very similar positions on most key issues.

C. The Workers Party only runs political candidates in local elections, including those for city council members, assemblymen, and mayors.

D. Polls indicate that most voters believe that candidates for third parties are more honest and trustworthy than are candidates for major national parties.

E. The dissolution of a major political party inevitably causes many voters to change their long-standing voting habits and vote for parties they have never voted for in the past.

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pk14y · Answer

How is it C when the claim is that  third parties   including the Worker's Party  are the ones who won't do well in presidential election. Having one example of a single third party does not make it true for the entire group.

Bunuel · Answer

Knewton Official Explanation

This argument says that, due to the dissolution of a major party, a small, third party will gain a larger share of the votes in the upcoming presidential election from the remaining major party than the now-defunct major party would have otherwise taken. This is a convoluted phrase; in other words, it means that the Freedom Party might have taken 10,000 votes from the Liberty Party in the national president election, but now (the argument claims), third parties will take more than 10,000 votes from the Liberty Party in the presidential election.

To weaken this claim, we must find a reason that major parties (and specifically, the Freedom Party) are not vulnerable to losing votes to small, third parties.

Choice C is correct.  This choice states that Workers Party candidates compete in local elections and may not even run a candidate for president at all. Because this choice implies that the Workers Party could not play a major role in a national election, it weakens the argument, which claims that a national party (the Freedom party) would be less competitive against the Liberty Party in a national election than would the Workers Party.

Choice A  makes an irrelevant comparison. It is a real-life (but not a safe GMAT) assumption that a third party would have worse  "name recognition"  than a major party. Moreover, there is no information in the passage about which parties have positions that match public opinion.

Choices B  also makes an irrelevant comparison. This choice is about the perceived similarity between the the two major parties in terms of their positions on major issues, a criterion that is never even mentioned in the argument, let alone linked to electoral success. Even if this quality was relevant to electoral success, we have no way of knowing whether voters are frustrated with this similarity and looking for an alternative or are perfectly happy with it.

Choice D  is, if anything, a strengthener, not a weakener, of the argument in the passage. It implies that third parties have a certain advantage over major national parties, which may support the claim that the third party will provide serious competition for the Liberty Party.

Choice E  is irrelevant; because there is no way to determine how voters  "voted in the past,"  it is impossible to predict whether the changes will benefit or hurt the Liberty Party. It is equally possible, given the situation, that the people who once voted for the Freedom Party will shift their alliances to the Liberty Party or to the Workers Party, or that voters will switch from third parties to the Liberty Party; without stronger numbers, this choice cannot weaken the claim in the argument.

Answer: C

gullyboy09 · Answer

Hi  MartyMurray , can you please help me with this question, option B? In option B, if most voters had considered the Freedom Party and the Liberty Party to have very similar positions on most key issues, then post dissolution, voters of freedom party are likely to move to liberty party as both the parties hold "very" "similar" positions on "most" "key" issues.

Moreover in option C, it talks about only one party (worker party), so it might be possible that all the other third parties might benefit a lot and it hurts Liberty party.

guddo · Answer

The recently announced dissolution of the Freedom Party, a major national political party, will not benefit the one other major national political party, the Liberty Party. It will, however, help third parties, including the Workers Party, who will now take more votes away from the Liberty Party in the upcoming national presidential race than would have been taken by the Freedom Party, had it not been dissolved.
 
 Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the claim made in the last sentence above?

The claim is that, after the Freedom Party disappears, third parties will take more votes from the Liberty Party in the upcoming presidential race than the Freedom Party would have taken. So the best weakener is the one that most directly shows that this prediction about third parties in that race cannot hold.  A direct factual block is stronger than an indirect shift in voter preference.

(A) Name recognition is a better predictor of a political party's success than how well its positions match with public opinion.

This is too general. It does not tell us whether third parties will actually take more votes from Liberty in this election.

(B) Most voters had considered the Freedom Party and the Liberty Party to have very similar positions on most key issues.

This weakens the claim somewhat, because it suggests former Freedom voters might move to Liberty rather than to third parties. But it is still only indirect.

(C) The Workers Party only runs political candidates in local elections, including those for city council members, assemblymen, and mayors.

This is the strongest weakener.  The claim specifically says third parties, including the Workers Party, will take more votes from Liberty in the upcoming national presidential race.  But if the Workers Party does not run candidates in presidential elections, then it cannot take any votes in that race. That directly undercuts the prediction made in the conclusion.

(D) Polls indicate that most voters believe that candidates for third parties are more honest and trustworthy than are candidates for major national parties.

This actually tends to support the claim that third parties may gain votes.

(E) The dissolution of a major political party inevitably causes many voters to change their long-standing voting habits and vote for parties they have never voted for in the past.

This is too vague. Those voters could move either to Liberty or to third parties.

Answer: (C)

The recently announced dissolution of the Freedom Party, a major

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The recently announced dissolution of the Freedom Party, a major

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