TO-WIT: ATTILA THE JUDGE
Like most of you, I am a busy, successful private practitioner. Accordingly, I do not usually watch afternoon television. I mean, what with the pursuit of my lifelong ambition to be a world-class golfer, I just don't have a lot of free afternoons.
Recently, however, following up on the advice of my golf pro that I could significantly improve my game by laying off for two weeks and then quitting altogether, I decided to utilize the free time I would have otherwise spent on the golf course by staying home and excavating the great American novel I know is hidden somewhere deep within my creative psyche.
Alas, my efforts in the endeavor yet again yielded no fruit, and in the midst of my creative despair I turned on the television. I have to tell you I was truly astonished to discover how many "judge shows" there are on television now.
Of course, I remember Judge Wapner and "People's Court," the progenitor of this particular genre. Usually, I only caught his act when I was home sick with the flu, but, as I recall, he had a knowledge of the law and some understanding of the innate chicanery of some people. It was the legal system as soap opera, and I even enjoyed his dramatic tirades at some of the litigants - you know, the recalcitrant landlord or the obsequious car salesman or the gaudy hair dresser who ignored her client in the dryer while she gossiped with other patrons, thus causing the client's hair to turn the disquieting shade of orange. Taken as a whole, it's probably as close to a good flogging as our society will permit. No wonder it was so popular.
But now there are Judge Judy and Judge Hatchett and Judge Mills Lane and Judge Brown and Judge Ed Koch, (yes, the former mayor of New York) and God knows who else, and now it all seems like the legal system as theater of the absurd. Each seems to strive to outdo the other in the capacity to fling invectives, hurl barbs and deliver tirades of outrage and insults at the litigants who, presumably for their 15 minutes of notoriety and a concomitant fee, consent to be humiliated in public. I am not certain who here is the bigger prostitute, but I find the whole thing tasteless, unamusing, tedious and predictable, and I am not the least bit startled by their success.
These are, after all, nothing but lawyer jokes taken to the extreme. What else can you expect from a society that, after decades adapting to a fast food mentality, evidences more and more frustrations at the exceedingly deliberate machinations of a system that has failed to follow suit? I mean, come on now, what kind of gratification is it for someone victimized by egregious conduct to hire a lawyer and wait years for a successful resolution that, if it comes at all, arrives genteelly by written opinion? Where's the blood, where's the gore, where's that wonderful double bacon cheeseburger thunk of a baseball bat against skull that so many of our citizens yearn so incessantly for?
That chasm, that missing "thunk," is the void that popular culture has leaped in to fill, and thus we have this surfeit of "judge shows" in which the jurist is gauged not by his or her intellect and temperament, God forbid, but rather by his or her willingness to cater to the lust for blood eo instanter. In doing my research for this piece, I have watched several hours of these broadcasts, and I have come to the conclusion that, as barbarous as some of these faux judges are , they are still burdened by the cloak of civility. I think if they really want to sell the product, they need a judge who makes no pretense at courtesy, a judge who cares not a whit for the civilities of civil practice. It's what the public wants, it's what they crave, it's what they need to satisfy the lust that remains unfulfilled by the niceties of the law.
Now, I am known as a lawyer from who invectives flow like poo poo from a baby's bottom. I am known that way as a golfer too. Accordingly, I propose the following custom-designed judicial insults as a guaranteed, surefire way to catch the attention of a public obviously already enamored of the approach.
*"Just who the hell do you think you are, Padre?"
*"Listen, Toots, discriminating against the ugly is no violation of the law."
*"Tell you what, garçon, you eat a cockroach and see how you like it."
*"Bailiff, bailiff, hit this guy upside his head."
*"One more crack out of you and it's going to be jail time for both you and your baby."
Find me a judge with the wherewithal to deliver these lines and I will make him a star. Or better yet, let me do it. I've always wanted to be a judge, and God knows I have a lot of free afternoons on my hands.