Miss USA: New Winner, New Gaffe

The new Miss USA is a woman more accustomed to spreadsheets than catwalks: Erin Brady, a 25-year-old accountant and the current Miss Connecticut. Brady won last night after answering a question about the recent Supreme Court decision upholding widespread DNA swabbing, which she said she agreed with, the AP reports. The first runner-up was Miss Alabama Mary Margaret McCord, reports E! Online.

Brady, who plans to quit her job at Prudential Financial and spend the next year raising ovarian cancer awareness, says she hopes her victory will shatter stereotypes of airheaded beauty queens. Unfortunately, the Internet is abuzz today over a moment from the pageant that might give you Miss Teen South Carolina flashbacks. When asked about a recent report that women were often the primary breadwinners in their households, Miss Utah gave a meandering response about education. At one point she simply stopped speaking and smiled broadly for a moment, before eventually concluding that "we need to see how to … create education better." The full transcript is over at New York. (More Erin Brady stories.)