Logical Reasoning

PT17 · S3 · Q8 Political advocate: Campaigns for elective office

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Political advocate: Campaigns for elective office should be subsidized with public funds.

Conclusion (should)

Campaigns for elective office should be subsidized with public funds.

Evidence (one reason / another reason)

This would allow politicians to devote less time to fund-raising, thus giving campaigning incumbents more time to serve the public.

Such subsidies would make it possible to set caps on individual campaign contributions, thereby reducing the likelihood that elected officials will be working for the benefit not of the public but of individual large contributors.

Evaluate

The advocate makes a recommendation for using public funds in campaigns, presenting two benefits: less time spent on fundraising, allowing for more public service, and the ability to impose caps on contributions, reducing reliance on large donors and aligning elected officials' actions more closely with public interest.

We can predict potential answers like,

Goal

Let's find an answer whose trigger is applicable to subsidizing campaigns and whose outcome helps us conclude "we should subsidize it".

Which one of the following principles, if established, provides a basis for the advocate’s argument?

Correct
If complete reliance on private
Why this is right
Wow, this is gross. In simple terms, it's saying "If an activity would bring the public a benefit, we should use public funds for it." The activity is campaigning for office. The status quo is complete reliance private funding, which deprives the public from having their incumbent work for their benefit full time (instead of using lots of time to raise funds for their campaign. If public funds were used to subsidize the campaigns, we were told that the public would enjoy the benefit of having an incumbent who can focus more on serving them. So the trigger applies to subsidizing campaigns, and the outcome says "public funds should be provided [for subsidizing campaigns]", which is a perfect match for our conclusion.
Skill tested: Principle-Strengthen · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
83% picked this
If election campaigns are to
Bad Conclusion Match
This principle would allow us to conclude "terms should be lengthened", but we're looking for "campaigns should be subsidized" .
1% picked this
If in an election campaign
Weaker Conclusion Match
This would allow us to conclude that "we should subsidize the rivals' campaigns." That's more specific than the argument's conclusion that we should subsidize all campaigns. The evidence never spoke of contributions being lopsided, so it also doesn't connect to the evidence.
3% picked this
If public funding of some
Bad Conclusion/Evidence Match
The outcome of this one is "campaigns should NOT be fully subsidized". We want a conclusion that's saying that "campaigns should be subsidized".. The trigger doesn't match "subsidizing campaigns" either. Yes, it produces a benefit to the public, but the evidence never said it inevitably produces a special benefit for specific people.
10% picked this
If a person would not
Bad Conclusion Match
The outcome of this principle is that "Person X should not be eligible for campaign subsidies". We want our outcome to match "campaigns should be subsidized".
2% picked this

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