Vignere Cipher Encode/Decode

#!/usr/bin/env python

import itertools
import string
import collections

lowercase = collections.deque( string.ascii_lowercase + string.digits )

# Getting the message...
h = open('flag.enc')
message = h.read()
h.close()

key = 'blaise'

def encrypt( message, key, multipler = -1 ):

    compressed_message = message.lower()

    for punctuation in str(string.punctuation + ' '):
        compressed_message = compressed_message.replace(punctuation, '')
    cycler = itertools.cycle(key.lower())

    long_key = ''.join( [ cycler.next() for _ in range(len(compressed_message))] )

    coded = []
    for number in range(len(long_key)):

        cipher_letter = compressed_message[number]
        key_letter = long_key[number]
        key_index = string.ascii_lowercase.index(key_letter)
        cipher_index = string.ascii_lowercase.index(cipher_letter)

        lowercase = collections.deque( string.ascii_lowercase )
        lowercase.rotate( multipler * key_index )
        new_alphabet = ''.join(list(lowercase))
        new_character = new_alphabet[cipher_index]
        coded.append( new_character )

    return ''.join(coded)

def decrypt( message, key, multipler = -1 ):

    return encrypt( message, key, 1 )

print message
print decrypt(message, key)

# cryptaclysmevenindecipherablecipherscanbebroken
# czqtulctqwn{Pvmf_Mooekatipritpf_Nixzisd_Cif_Ff_Mrwcio}
# cryptaclysm{Even_Indecipherable_Ciphers_Can_Be_Broken}