Area Father Puts Everything In Terms Of Hitler

ANN ARBOR - The Sheldon family patriarch, Jim, always puts things he needs a comparison for in terms of the Nazi tyrant and murderer Adolf Hitler, sources close to the Jim Sheldon situation are reporting.

The borderline-offensive personal quirk appeared last week when Sheldon learned his wife would be late to dinner because of car trouble.

“Betty missing family time tonight is like...Hitler ditching Mussolini in Munich in 1940,” Jim Sheldon postulated, offering an upturned palm and regarding his children with raised eyebrows. “Mussolini wouldn’t have liked that very much, would he, kids?”

Billy Sheldon, 8, was subjected to a comparison involving Hitler later that evening after the child scraped his knee and started to cry.

“There, there, Billy. Crying over a scraped knee is like...Hitler crying over a few dead Germans in Leningrad,” Sheldon consoled his son.

Sheldon, a 57-year old house painter and frequenter of History Channel programming, hasn’t updated his cultural or historical references beyond the death of the Nazi leader in 1945.

“Jim is not only clueless about computers and the internet, but also about the modern kitchen, birth control, Vietnam, supply-side economics, and September 11th,” Betty Sheldon said in an interview. “My husband updating his reference points would be like... Hitler trying to understand Google Earth.”

She added, “Oh my God, I’m doing it too.”

Sheldon’s children were also unaware that using Hitler as a reference point might ruffle a few feathers.

“Dad not using Hitler as a reference point would be like...Joseph Goebbels refusing to be Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda in 1933,” said Franny Sheldon, 13.

Social psychologist Dr. Michael Ferro offered his reasoning for Jim Sheldon’s preoccupation with the Nazi leader. “Hitler occupies a preeminent place in the psyche of many post-war baby boomers,” Dr. Ferro said. “His example is often called forth as a way to put the situation in perspective. There isn’t anything deliberately anti-Semitic or laudatory of Hitler in what Mr. Sheldon is doing. He’s just the big personality of the bygone generation.”

“Not believing that theory would be like... Hitler not believing that the Allies would march all the way to Berlin,” Dr. Ferro added.

Dr. Ferro was found slain later that day in an unrelated incident.