Although inflated government spending for weapons research encourages waste at weapons research laboratories, weapons production plants must be viewed as equally wasteful of taxpayer dollars. After all, by the government' s own admission, the weapons plant it plans to reopen will violate at least 69 environmental, health, and safety laws. The government has decided to reopen the plant and exempt it from compliance, even though the weapons to be produced there could be produced at the same cost at a safer facility. The reasoning in the argument is most vulnerable to criticism on which one of the following grounds? ['It concedes a point regarding weapons research laboratories that undermines its conclusion about weapons production plants.', 'It fails to establish that research laboratories and weapons production plants are similar enough to be meaningfully compared.', 'It offers no evidence that the "safer" alternative production site actually complies with any of the laws mentioned.', 'It relies on evidence that does not directly address the issue of wasteful spending.']