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'Adolf, friend to animals'

Did you know that when Adolf Hitler was a teenager, he once got so drunk that he used his high school diploma as toilet paper before passing out on the side of a road?

If not, then you obviously haven't been spending enough of your free time perusing AdolftheGreat.com, a revisionist website that portrays the man responsible for the deaths of 72 million people in World War II as a misunderstood genius, poet, painter, inventor, animal lover, lady's man and life of the party.

The Nazi party, that is.

Just when it seemed that the limits of grotesque and appalling stupidity had been reached, along came Adolf the Great to remind us that bug-eating TV game show contestants and the breathlessly reported travails of drug-addicted starlets are actually relatively civilized fare. True mindless tastelessness finds a home in Adolf the Great categories like "Adolf & Recreation," "Adolf & the Volkswagen," "Adolf Fights Breast Cancer" and "Adolf the Unknown Artist." Fittingly, the site launched in 2006 on April 20 — Hitler's birthday. Sadly, it had logged almost 39,000 visitors by early August of this year.

Along with the mediocre watercolor landscapes reproduced in the "Unknown Artist" section, Hitler's art is also displayed in "Adolf, Friend to Animals." The section features a pencil sketch of Hitler's "best friend," a German Shepherd named Blondi, and praises the dictator's devotion to "protecting our furry friends."

The "Adolf, Friend to Animals" section also boasts that Hitler outlawed vivisection and flaunts a propaganda poster labeled "Vivisection Verboten" that depicts a crowd of cartoon lab animals — rabbits, dogs, pigeons, frogs and what appear to be beavers — gratefully sieg-heiling Reichsmarschall Goering. Had enough yet? Under "Adolf the Child," the website reveals that when Hitler was but a wee lad, "He loved to sing the German national anthem 'Deutschland Über Alles' and would greet his friends with a cheery 'Heil.' But whenever there was action or mischief, Adolf was the ringleader."

According to "Adolf and Women," Hitler was "extremely shy with girls when he was young." But in later years, "He was considered 'gallant' by ladies, who found him to have a charming and friendly manner; always polite and respectful toward the fairer sex. He was never rude nor used foul language before a lady." No mention is made of the apparent suicides of two of Hitler's mistresses (some historians believe that Hitler had either or both women murdered) or the fact that Hitler's most famous female companion, Eva Braun, attempted suicide twice after becoming the object of his gallantry. The site identifies Braun as "Eva Hitler," a reference to their short-lived marriage. The ceremony took place on April 29, 1945, in Hitler's underground Führerbunker in Berlin as Russian troops closed in on the city. The bride and groom both killed themselves the next day. Adolf the Great glosses over these morbid details in a section titled "Adolf and Eva Hitler, a True Love Story," that's decorated with a photo of Eva in a dirndl picking wildflowers. "Eva loved Adolf. Adolf loved Eva," the text begins. "And for years destiny kept them apart as Adolf's work took him away for long periods of time."

The long hours of starting a world war, enslaving nations and presiding over the murder of millions would put a strain on any relationship. But Adolf the Great's "true love" story has a happy ending, sort of: "In the Berlin bunker, facing Russian soldiers and a fate worse than death if she stayed, Eva remained with her husband despite him ordering her to leave. She was loyal even unto death."

The Adolf the Great site addresses the Holocaust — the industrialized murder of almost 6 million men, women and children who were Jewish — only in passing.

"There are many other sites on the Internet that serve the needs of people who wish to study these facts and some are recommended via links," it explains. The recommended links include the website of the neo-Nazi National Alliance and that of leading Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel.