Yes It Is It’s True: ‘Purple Patty’ and Leni Riefenstahl

I propose that the late State Rep. and State Senator Patty Birkholz was a low-key Leni Riefenstahl.

Ms. Birkholz, whose death was duly noted last week after a pioneering political career for Michigan women, appears to me to have led a life very similar to that of the controversial and enigmatic Riefenstahl. Both indeed were pioneers in their fields, complete with really positive attributes, yet at the same time negative baggage.

For those not hip about Riefenstahl, she was a brilliant German actress, dancer, photographer, cinematographer and film director and producer. She was the first serious female film director and producer, most notably putting together The Triumph of the Will, a propagandistic horror show about Adolf Hitler and a Nazi Party rally in 1934 and she broke a lot of artistic ground with Olympiad, a visual feast of the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin.

She was enigmatic because she had a keen eye and mind for compassion and intelligence, yet remained unapologetic for promoting one of history’s most evil men until her death at age 101.

So it seemed with Birkholz, who started her political career as a township official and clawed her way through the political jungle to become county treasurer, state representative and state senator. She was the first woman ever elected to the No. 2 slot in the Michigan Senate and at one time was considered heavily as a running mate for Gov. John Engler’s third four-year term and Gov. Rick Synder’s first run in 2010.

Birkholz, known as “Purple Patty,” for constantly wearing the color and called “Pincushion Patty” by less charitable observers, carved out a formidable reputation as an environmentalist, no mean feat being a member of a party that wasn’t particularly fond of tree huggers. She did a lot of work on behalf of the sand dunes along the west coast of Lake Michigan, which wasn’t surprising because her home town was Saugatuck.

Yet her life, like Riefenstahl’s, was much more complicated.

I was told by an excellent source that she kicked out of the house one of her sons because he was gay and spent a long time disowning him. So much for family values.

I was also told by an excellent source that she had an extra-marital affair with a Hope College professor, who committed suicide. His wife was an Allegan County Commissioner.

I witnessed how she conducted what I regard as one of the most brutal and ugly campaigns for State Senate in 2002. She absolutely trashed her GOP rival, State Rep. Terry Geiger, sending a flyer all over the 24th District showing an unflattering picture of Geiger and hammering him for being picked up for drunken driving.

I knew Geiger was going through a difficult divorce, which was no excuse for operating while impaired, but former State Rep. Bob Genetski had the same misfortune without the consequences of being turned away at the polls. Genetski can consider himself lucky he wasn’t running for his seat in Lansing against Birkholz or her ilk.

Birkholz on the surface was a very pleasant person, but underneath the veneer was a ruthless opportunist not unlike the personality of Hillary Clinton.

I suppose it’s bad form to criticize the dearly departed, as a college professor in California learned recently after the passing of former First Lady Barbara Bush. Yet it seems important to me to present information that though people like Birkholz and Riefenstahl had their outstanding qualities, they also had their warts.

Such is the human condition for nearly all of us.