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The following began life as a Top Ten list of "Mistakes Made by Adolf Hitler." It was passed around during a lecture in a political science class of mine and soon grew to over 100 entries. I have culled out the stupid and/or truly offensive ones, as well as any that said nasty things about any particular nationality (read, the French). You'll have to excuse the fact that some of them are rather obscure, but that's what happens when you get a bunch of political scientists in the same room. Without further ado, I give you...

Top 60 Mistakes Made by Adolf Hitler

  1. Land War in Asia
  2. Changed name from highly catchy "Schickelgruber" to boring "Hitler"
  3. Leaving his little mustache: not growing a friendly Abe Lincoln beard to instill trust among subjects
  4. Not buying lifts for his shoes
  5. Failure to exploit Me 262 Messerschmidt
  6. Failure to exploit Eva Braun
  7. Chose swastika as party symbol rather than the daisy
  8. Chose Josef Goebels rather than Marlene Dietrich to promote Nazi image
  9. Chose "Deutschland Uber Alles" over "Let's All Be There" as party slogan
  10. Lost the Ark to Indiana Jones
  11. Chose unfashionable blacks and browns rather than trendy plaids and stripes as uniform colors for SS & SA
  12. Referring to Stalin as "that old Georgian fat back"
  13. Indiscriminate use of V-2 rockets for public fireworks displays
  14. Free beer in munitions plants
  15. Lisp never corrected
  16. Bad toupee
  17. Refused to undergo nostril reduction surgery
  18. Failed to conquer strategically important Comoros Islands
  19. Fell asleep in staff meetings
  20. Chose Italy as ally
  21. Land War in Asia
  22. Got involved with a Sicilian when death was on the line
  23. Made pass at Eleanor Roosevelt during 1936 Olympics
  24. Built heliport on top of new Reichstag building which looked remarkably like a bullseye from the air
  25. Always got Churchill out of bed for conference calls
  26. Never had fireside mass rallies
  27. Told Einstein he had a stupid name
  28. Used SS instead of LAPD
  29. Admired Napoleon's strategy
  30. Strong fondness for saurkraut and beans made General Staff avoid him constantly
  31. In last days, chose to hide in bunker rather than ask U.S. for a little country place in Hawaii
  32. Nightmare involving Pillsbury Doughboy haunted him constantly with war advice
  33. Major theme in speeches -- liebensraum, or "living room" -- widely misperceived as call for domestic architectural reform
  34. Failed to revoke Rudolph Hess' pilot licence.
  35. Pissed off Jesse Owens at 1936 Olympics
  36. Didn't put his brother Billy in the concentration camps. When word got out that Billy was just a beer guzzling fat guy in a small town in Bavaria who grew peanuts it was bad P.R. for Der Fuhrer
  37. Breast feeding for too long
  38. Passed up Finish "tanks for snowshoes" offer before invasion of USSR
  39. Drank too much at Beer Hall Putsch
  40. Spent jail time planning how to conquer the world instead of his own escape.
  41. Forgot to write "Dear Joey" letter to Stalin before invasion of Poland
  42. Blew nose on Operation Barbarossa maps, forcing extemporaneous invasion of Soviet Union
  43. Took no steps to keep Neville Chamberlin in power
  44. Chose the Tirpitz for that weekend of love with Eva in the fjords
  45. Frequently mistaken for Charlie Chaplin due to mustache; undermined credibility (as when he threatened to invade Poland, everyone waited for the punchline)
  46. Came off as poor loser when "Triumph of the Will" failed to win Oscar for "Best Foreign Documentary"--"You don't like me" speech undermined image.
  47. Used to make prank calls to FDR asking if he had "Prince Albert in a can"
  48. Forgot correct interpretation of Nietzche; caused much embarrassment when he used to cite philosophical support for his concept of the "Oberdude"
  49. Got drunk on schnapps and suggested Tojo attack the U.S. saying, "The U.S. only has twenty times your industrial power, what are you, a wimp?"
  50. Listened to too much Wagner and not enough Peter, Paul and Mary
  51. Spent too much on screwdrivers and toilet seats
  52. Tried to play football with Axis Lucy who pulled the ball away at the last second
  53. Failed to encourage tourism
  54. Being born
  55. Never did the honorable thing with Eva Braun
  56. Alienated Chamberlin at Munich by sticking an "Invade me" sign on his back
  57. Kept Colonel Klink in command
  58. Churchill mistakenly thought "Deutschland Uber Alles" was a veiled threat
  59. Used same astrologer as the Reagans
  60. Land War in Asia