Score Skulduggery

Ordinarily, one might easily overlook an Associated Press dispatch of April 22, stating that a Russian ice hockey team played the East German All-Stars. One might also overlook the fact that Communist newspapers "stressed that friendship was the thing and the score was no object." But one cannot overlook the fact that the score of this apparently innocent game of ice hockey was 23 to 2.

As anyone knows who has read the CRIMSON at any time during the past 50 years, there is a traditional baseball game between the editors of the CRIMSON and the Lampoon. There is also a traditional score of 23 to 2, in favor of the healthier and more rugged newspaper men. The "coincidence" is a little staggering.

The Russians are crafty. Their machinations are often made to look like "coincidences." What are they up to now?

The answer is that they are attempting to steal a respected CRIMSON-Lampoon tradition, just as they have attempted to steal everything from the invention of the telephone to the atom bomb. They realize that the 23-2 score is a thing that anyone would be proud to own, and they want it for themselves.

There is no possible way to condone this banditry. In America, when you want a tradition you make your own, you don't steal the one your neighbor has spent years making. That's the American way. If the Communists wanted a traditional score, they could have used 23-1, 23-3, or any number of other unclaimed lopsided numbers. Just because the Lampoon is in too weak a condition to protest, the Russians thought they could get away unchastised. Not so: the editors of the CRIMSON protest, and will not rest until our rightful score is returned to us.