Downtown Scotty Brown

The article I'll be referring to can be found here:

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/2012/2012/10/23/bdc-scott-brown-the-model-gallery/hxcGNdX5JulyXJuZoFo9YN/gallery.html?pg=1&t=150&cp=1

The reason I chose this article -- hilarity aside -- is that it fits fairly well with our recent focus on attention and the economics thereof.

I'm unsure if it's because I live in a primarily blue state, but it seems the GOP is somewhat rife with these sorts of faux pas. Earlier, we had the Paul Ryan gym photoshoot, and now this has cropped up. Granted, Brown's former modelling career is fairly well-known, but with the Senate election coming up, it's been referenced to more and more.

It's obvious that the media are using the economics of attention to their benefit. In this sense, they are bombarding their chosen public with sensational images, such as a scantily clad Brown. This then grabs peoples' attention and makes them buy newspapers or look at websites or however they choose to consume this news.

Likewise, this operates on a level of attention-grabbing to the benefit of the Democratic party. While one could argue that Brown's photo shoots might instead benefit him -- perhaps displaying him as an attractive man-beast or some such -- I doubt this will be the outcome. Instead, peoples' attention are focused on the ridiculousness of the photos taken, thereby removing their attention from anything Brown's opponent might be doing wrong.