When it comes to names, the name Adolf Hitler sends shivers down many a spine.  We have come to associate that name with evil incarnate, with demons that inhabit a fiery hell, and a monster that unleashed a plague upon humanity.

Strangely enough, however, Adolf Hitler actually had many admirers the world over.  Before his descent into megalomania and what surely must have been the crafting of a pact with the Devil, Hitler was on the right track in moving Germany out of the economic depression that gripped the world during the twentieth century.

During 1933 to 1937, many world leaders visited Germany to study Hitler’s achievements during his reign.  Pointedly, they avoided the concentration camps, and walked away enchanted by The Fuehrer.  If they weren’t enchanted, perhaps Adolf’s chefs had served them up some funny mushrooms as a side dish to wiener schnitzel.   All these world leaders saw a great man embarking on a socialist plan to unify his country.  That plan included the establishment of public schools, a national healthcare program, public works, wage and price controls, national service, a national youth corps, and government spending, all designed to achieve full employment.  Backed by a strong military, Hitler had configured his plan to combat both Communism and terrorism.

But, The Fuehrer also had admirations of his own.  Among them was a fascination for the occult; often, he engaged the services of psychics and astrologers before making a move.  Too bad none of these lackeys had the you-know-what’s to tell him he was born under a bad sign with a blue moon in his eyes.

Oddly enough, Hitler also admired America and certain things American.  In 1934, he sent congratulations to President Roosevelt for the policies that FDR had enacted to resolve  America’s economic woes.   Something else, however, put a twinkle in Hitler’s eye, something he’d found right here in the Garden State of New Jersey.  No, it wasn’t our swamps or our casinos.  Or our strip malls either.  Hitler, it seemed, had a soft place in his heart for the militaristic approach of the New Jersey State Police.  Moreover, he found their uniforms oh zo fetching!

Zo enamored was he that he modeled an arm of Germany’s law enforcement — the SS, or Storm Troopers — upon New Jersey’s State Police, employing the SS to enforce his increasingly psychotic mandates.  Hitler also modeled his officers’ uniforms upon those of our State troopers, assuming that the very look of them would strike fear into the hearts of those he sought to oppress.

Did the Devil make him do it?  And if so, was it the Jersey Devil?  Or was it one of Hitler’s psychics?  Was one of his seers on the money with a prediction about Jersey’s future population explosion and resultant breeding of the worst drivers in all fifty States?  Did the clairvoyant alert The Fuehrer that if a relative handful of Jersey Troopers, so outfitted, could adequately police this many lousy drivers, that Germany should tip their pointed helmets to them by dressing up as them?    

As a New Jerseyan, how do feel about Adolf now?  Do you  consider it a step up or a step down that he so admired our State?  Should there be media-driven opinion poll of the drivers that use the New Jersey Turnpike and the Garden State Parkway as to what to name our law enforcement officers patrolling our highways?

It was another highway upon which my wife and I embarked a few years ago, when we engaged a shuttle to take us to the Philadelphia Airport.  After picking us up at our home, the driver advised us that he had one more pickup before setting out for our destination. He mentioned the name of the apartment complex where he was to pick up the other passenger who would be accompanying us to the airport. 

When we picked up the new passenger, after a wrong turn down Church Road (an omen if ever I saw one), we proceeded to the airport.

My wife struck up a conversation with the new passenger, a woman.  During the conversation, my better half mentioned that I was a veteran of World War II.  This led to the retelling of the conflict that, of course, came to make mention of Adolf Hitler. The driver of our shuttle, who up until then had been a passive listener, entered the conversation.  He said that he was of German ethnicity and that his mother-in law was a dyed-in-the-wool German. He further stated that she, along with some Germans, believed that the only thing that Adolf Hitler did wrong “Vas lose!”  Thus, did our conversation end abruptly.  I was never so glad to see the Philly Airport!

Down through the years, despite Hitler’s heinous acts, many prominent people have praised him. To name a few, there were Winston Churchill (surprise!), Lloyd George, and even Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has publicly admired the Fuehrer for his oratory and national policies.  Books written by authors John Toland (Adolf Hitler) and William L. Shirer (The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich) point out different perspectives of this man beyond the psychotic into which he would ultimately devolve.

Hollywood has made millions on movies about the Third Reich, both positive and negative.  As Hollywood is dominated, for the most part, by Jewish people, this is interesting. Starring Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder, Mel Brooks’ The Producers parodied the Third Reich in a hilarious 1960s spoof spawned initially from a play that was later revived on Broadway, just a few years ago, in fact.

The original Three Stooges (Larry, Moe, and Curly) also sent up Hitler and the Axis Forces in one of their most brilliant and riveting short films.  Moe, playing Hitler, wore a false moustache.  When that moustache was ripped off early in the film, in a minor skirmish, he thundered, “Give me back my personality!” On Hitler’s conference room desk sat a large globe.  When the other Axis representatives appeared for a meeting of the minds, they all began arguing, like children in a sandbox, about which one of them was going to control the world .  Hitler shrieked, “The vorld is mine!”, grabbed the globe, and ran off with it … but not far.

The argument descended into a clumsy, frenzied, and hysterical game of basketball.   Eventually, the Axis leaders were all blown up, courtesy of a rigged golf ball delivered by a beautiful blond spy.

The beloved Stooges, who were Jewish and who all hailed from Brooklyn, New York, could have taken this film in an entirely different direction. Instead, they chose to depict Hilter and his henchmen as bumbling, brainless idiots — thus illustrating that even dictators and certain law enforcement representatives are good for a laugh.

Aren’t they?

Well, why don’t you test the theory?

Now that you know all the facts about Hitler and his admiration for New Jersey, the next time that a State Trooper pulls you over on the New Jersey Turnpike, consider your response.  You can either hand over your license and registration morosely, and accept your summons, or you can step out of your car smartly and click your heels together (and not like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz).  With your right hand raised and fingers pointing skyward, you can bark, “Seig Heil!”

The officer will either smile … hopefully because he knows the history behind the design of the SS uniforms … or you are going to be guest of the State, and not in a four-star hotel. 

If it’s the latter, you are going to jail as in the game Monopoly, and just as in that game, you’ll go directly to jail without passing Go.  If so, you’d better hope that the hanging judge has a better sense of humor!