Paid defense attorneys are no better, unfortuneately. They have to worry about being "too agressive" in defending their clients, or the judge will just start screwing all of their clients, and their careers will be ruined.
I should have made that point as well. You are correct, even privately retained defense attorneys are hesitant to go after the bad rulings or abuses by judges. Two years ago, I was a subject of a criminal referral to the county prosecutor for intimidating a prosecutor and a judge. When I found out about it, it had a little 'conversation' with the deputy prosecutor assigned to the case. I informed him that if he was so foolish as to actually file charges, I would not hire an attorney and would be calling a number of judges, the prosecutor, the sheriff and his deputies, and other public officials as witnesses and assured him that they would all be asserting their 5th amendment rights within about 5 minutes each. Never heard a word from them after that.