Periscope

Nor was such penalty reserved for the mighty. Last week a poor Shiite family showed up at a human-rights group in Baghdad to see if they could find where their son's body might be buried; they produced the official death warrant that ordered him executed "for telling jokes and showing disrespect to Saddam Hussein and other officials." When jokes could kill, Iraqis traded them in secret. Now the laughter is gushing out. Iraqis are beginning to tell jokes about the Americans, too. Here's one that covers three nationalities: A TV interviewer asks an American, an Afghan and an Iraqi, in turn: "What is your opinion about electricity shortages?" The American replies, "What's an 'electricity shortage'?" The Afghan says, "What's an 'electricity'?" The Iraqi says, "What's an 'opinion'?"

--Rod Nordland

Religion: Impolitic Timing

Last month the pope beatified a 17th-century Capuchin priest who's perhaps most famous for preventing a Muslim invasion of Europe. When the Ottoman Turks tried to seize Vienna in 1683, the priest, Marco d'Aviano, led the Christian armies to victory. Legend has it that when the Turks fled they forgot their coffee--leaving it to the triumphant Viennese, who named their new favorite beverage cappuccino, after the order to which d'Aviano had dedicated his life.

Forget coffee, says the Vatican, which is too busy defending the pope's heralding of an anti-Muslim crusader to be much interested in Starbucks prehistory. In his beatification speech, the pope said d'Aviano is a symbol that Europe's "unity will be more stable if it is based on its common Christian roots." A Vatican spokeswoman defends the impolitic choice of d'Aviano for public exaltation in late April, and asserts that he has been slated for "some time now." But John Allen, Vatican correspondent for the Kansas City, Missouri-based National Catholic Reporter, thinks the timing was calculated, noting that the Vatican has insisted that the EU's constitutional document include a specific reference to the Christian identity of Europe as the basis for its value system. Not surprisingly, delegates from some countries, including France and Sweden, balked.

--Suzanne Smalley and Barbie Nadeau