备考资料：关于GMAT优秀作文

The following appeared in a letter to the editor of a regional newspaper.

In response to petitions from the many farmers and rural landowners throughout our region, the legislature has spent valuable time and effort enacting severe laws to deter motorists from picking fruit off the trees, trampling through the fields, and stealing samples of foliage. But how can our local lawmakers occupy themselves with such petty vandalism when crime and violence plague the nations cities? The fate of apples and leaves is simply too trivial to merit their attention.

Discuss how well reasoned... etc.

The author of this editorial asserts that trespassing, vandalism, and theft associated with stealing fruit from farms is a trivial problem and, as a result, enacting laws to protect farm- and land-owners from these crimes is a waste of lawmakers time. In support of this claim, the author points out only that the nations cities are plagued by far more serious problems of violence and crime. To the extent that this author has provided any argument at all, it is a poor one.

First of all, the author unfairly assumes that if lawmakers are taking rural crime issues seriously, then they cannot be taking urban crime issues seriously. The author is presenting a false dilemma by imposing an either-or choice between two courses of action that need not be mutually exclusive. It is equally possible that legislators can address both areas of concern concurrently.