Zelandakh, on 2013-January-23, 07:17, said:
I didn't say anywhere that the defense was going to get 2 tricks (nor that they would get 1 trick).
I stated that if East would knowingly and deliberately try to tell his partner what card to play, we don't need the law book. We need a rod to cane him. (Please don't take this literally.)
If East made a silly incorrect claim, we rule using the Laws that deal with incorrect claims. In this case that means that we need to judge how 'normal' it would be for West to overtake.
The lawbook is written to deal with irregularities, not with crimes against humanity. The idea is to fix the situation, not to penalize. In many cases, one could see this as "an open invitation to cheats". It has been argued many times that in bridge crime does pay: If you get away with the crime, hurray!! and if you don't, you fall back where you would have been if you were a law abiding citizen. Some people, therefore, advocate mandatory PPs for (some) irregularities. I don't.
The vast majority of bridge players play as a hobby because they want to solve intellectual puzzles or something similar. This gives them satisfaction. For this they pay membership fees and/or table money. They aren't interested in cheating because cheating doesn't give that satisfaction. So why would they waste their money on something that doesn't bring them anything?
The pro players can't afford to cheat. They are under a magnifying glass and their reputation will be ruined if they cheat.
So what remains is a very small group of players that do cheat. The lawbook doesn't deal with them because it is designed to fix the issues for the honest players, but boards of bridge clubs / NBOs / abuse@BBO do. People do get suspended (ok, not caned). When word gets out why John Smith doesn't show up at the club any more (and it always does) that does have consequences for the cheats.
Rik