Wednesday, April 06, 2022

Eric Boehlert, Media Critic, Killed In Bicycle Accident

Eric Boehlert, a progressive media critic and founder of the Press Run newsletter, was killed Monday evening after being struck by a train while riding his bicycle in Montclair, New Jersey. He was only 56.

The Daily Beast noted "the circumstances surrounding the accident were unclear". Boehlert's wife said he biked through Montclair every evening and always wore high-vis gear and flashing lights.

Boehlert wrote about music for Billboard and Rolling Stone before covering the media for Salon. He was also a senior fellow at Media Matters for America. He founded Press Run in January 2020, promising an "unfiltered, passionate, and proudly progressive critique of the political press". (I was a proud subscriber.)

Boehlert called out blatant disinformation and bothsides-ism in the mainstream media and was relentless about the steadfast refusal of The New York Times and Washington Post (and many others) to use the word "lies" to describe any of Trump's 30,000+ lies while in office. Once Trump was out of office and access was not an issue, the media gave in and used the word "lies" a few times, here and there, but not so often that you'd notice it.

Boehlert was also the author of two books: Lapdogs: How The Press Rolled Over For Bush and Bloggers on the Bus: How The Internet Changed Politics and the Press.

Two of his last tweets highlighted the double standard when reporting on the two political parties:

1 comment:

  1. I didn't recognize his name when you told me about this, but I certainly know his byline. How terrible. Also strange. I wonder if it was intentional.

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