20 AUGUST 1954, Page 6

The Red Biddy Peril

It is not astonishing that Russia should remind its more escapist comrades that drunkenness as well as religion, private ownership and immorality are relics of an effete capitalist regime. The recent spread of alcoholism among the Russian poor is, with every other mischief, blamed on the Western powers, the insemination of whose depraved ideas is causing some concern. That Russia's ideas have considerable seepage power too is a fact of which we are all painfully aware, and it may comfort the Union to know that the debutantes of San Francisco have taken to drinking vodka. In the race to see which ideology can harm the other the most this round can be called a draw.