Traditionally, candidates for elected offices have concentrated their efforts on the early stages of the campaign during which, most people believed, the voters' perceptions of candidates were formed. It is now becoming clear, however, that elections can be decided in the few days preceding election day; public opinion polls taken during recent elections provide evidence of several such races. In those cases, the losing candidates would have been well advised to have forgone early spending and instead saved funds for television advertisements late in their campaigns.

Which of the following inferences can be most reasonably drawn from the information in the passage above?


A) Television has had an adverse effect on political campaigns, making them less issue-oriented.

B) Politicians of the pre-television era fail to understand the important role television advertising plays in today's political campaigns.

C) Public opinion polls often inaccurately reflect the mood of the electorate in the early stages of a political campaign.

D) Polls taken in the days preceding a major election may not accurately predict the outcome of an election.

E) Candidates should not try to define the key issues of a race until late in the campaign.


The argument is similar to the following link, but the question stem and options are different here: http://gmatclub.com/forum/traditionally ... 13345.html