The Oh, Hello and welcome to Behind the News, my name is Doug Henwood.

Today Carl Graham looks at the declining health and rising mortality of what is known in

shorthand as the white working class.

And at the bottom of the hour, Christian Godsy makes a return appearance to talk about the

noxious uses of anti-communism.

Before that, a few words in politics today.

I see a lot of people refusing to celebrate Tuesday's

primary victories by a number of candidates endorsed by the rapidly growing

Democratic socialists of America because they ran as Democrats and the Democrats

are a snare and a delusion. Yes they are, no

that about it. But Bernie Sanders did more to open up U.S. politics and anything in a long

long time and that wouldn't have happened had he not run as a Democrat even though

he's not one himself formally speaking. When I was all over he had to endorse

Hillary Clinton which is a reminder of the snare and delusion part but on the

other hand if he'd run as a green or some other off-brand, he probably

would have gone nowhere.

When you ask the critics what their strategy is, it's to organize a radical system-challenging

party outside the Democrats. But whether we're talking

about Trotsky's grouplets or the Green Party, people have been trying this for

decades and what do they have to show for it? The two-party system is a near

official status in the US and it's a very tough nut to crack.

So I'd say why not give this strategy a try?

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