PrepTest 123, Section 2, Question 19
By Brandon Beaver | Published October 29, 2024
Type: Strengthen
Difficulty:
Explanations
This is the flaw of cherry picking (using only data/circumstances that support your idea, while completely ignoring the others that might not). The historian mentions a set of circumstances that seem compelling, but what else was going on? A weakener will propose other circumstances or facts that might provide alternative explanations for the Land Party’s victory. Thus, strengtheners will do the opposite: foreclose those alternative explanations.
A
Bingo. Urban groups? They didn’t target them in this election either, so this doesn’t suggest any change in strategy. How would that strengthen? This is the answer because it’s a complete dud.
B
This strengtheners by explaining why those tactics might have worked.
C
This strengthens because it provides a correlation to support the cause and effect (not great evidence, but definitely some evidence).
D
This strengthens by foreclosing the objection that “every other party did that too, so why would the Land Party have won this time by doing the same thing as everyone else?”
E
This strengthens by explaining that, maybe, in preceding elections, not enough people the Land Party attempted to support actually went out to vote.
Passage
Historian: The Land Party achieved its only national victory in Banestria in 1935. It received most of its support that year in rural and semirural areas, where the bulk of Banestria's population lived at the time. The economic woes of the years surrounding that election hit agricultural and small business interests the hardest, and the Land Party specifically targeted those groups in 1935. I conclude that the success of the Land Party that year was due to the combination of the Land Party's specifically addressing the concerns of these groups and the depth of the economic problems people in these groups were facing.
Question 19
Each of the following, if true, strengthens the historian's argument EXCEPT:
In preceding elections the Land Party made no attempt to address the interests of economically distressed urban groups.
Voters are more likely to vote for a political party that focuses on their problems.
The Land Party had most of its successes when there was economic distress in the agricultural sector.
No other major party in Banestria specifically addressed the issues of people who lived in semirural areas in 1935.
The greater the degree of economic distress someone is in, the more likely that person is to vote.