Of course a bunch of companies have figured out how to get people's attention by generating outrage. It's very obvious how to enrage the left or the right, and it's very obvious that it's advantageous for many advertisers to do this to get attention. That's just easy to notice from the point of view of someone who thinks about politics. Now consider that they pay whole marketing departments whose entire purpose is to figure out how to get attention. And the people who control the politicians also pay people to come up with ideas to get the left or right's support without actually doing anything to help the country. Simply making the other side mad is enough to get their almost unanimous support at this point.