Verbal Challenge: Not only was his braggadocio boring, but his claims were...

GRE Verbal Challenge Question: 

Not only was his braggadocio boring, but his claims were_____; he obviously lacked the intellectual savvy to serve on the judiciary committee, and I suspected that he lacked the credentials as well.

A) incoherent
B) spurious
C) flippant
D) conversant
E) bogus
F) blasphemous

Directions: Select the two answer choices that, when used to complete the sentence, fit the meaning of the sentence as a whole and produce completed sentences that are alike in meaning.

Explanation:

In this sentence, the semicolon indicates that the clause that follows it helps explain the clause that precedes it. Therefore, we know that the man was neither intelligent nor qualified to brag as he did, and we can assume that the claims he made were false. The missing word will thus have a meaning similar to “false.” 

Answer choices (B) spurious and (E) bogus both mean “not genuine” or “false” and are the correct answers.

None of the other choices match our prediction. 

Choice (A) incoherent means “unintelligible,” and choice (C) flippant means “disrespectful;” either of these could fit the context of the sentence, but in both cases, no other choice produces a sentence with equivalent meaning. 

Choice (D)conversant means “familiar and knowledgeable,” and choice (F) blasphemous means “irreverent,” neither of which is supported by the context of the sentence. Therefore, choices (A), (C), (D), and (F) are incorrect.

Answer Choices (B) and (E) are the correct answers.