Since I live in a land where everyone, or almost everyone, gets an award for something, no matter how trivial, I am creating an award for the stupid, thoughtless things that lawyers and judges do. With an acknowledgement to the season, I am calling my award the “Headless Turkey” or should it be the “Heedless Turkey”? Whatever. I bestow this award (and no one is going to get a pardon like the White House turkey) on just a few of many deserving peeps. Selecting awardees is like shopping at Costco; the choices are many.
Do you think that lawyers and judges in hindsight ask themselves why they did the stupid, license-lifting, judge-admonishing, reputation-trashing things? What were they thinking? They weren’t. They acted just like chickens — or in this case, turkeys — with their heads cut off.
Might as well start with a former Ninth Circuit judge who had the