Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
And welcome to handle on the lawmarginal legal advice where I tell you you
have absolutely no case. A coupleof settlements I want to share with you
that have recently happened. One isfrom Phillips and they make a sea PAP
machine and ensuit a whole bunch oftimes and they have reached one point one
(00:25):
billion dollar settlement. I mean,these settlements are really astronomical. And these
have to do with it seapap youknow the things that help people with sleep
apnea. And you have that machineO rear face. There was a massive
recall in twenty twenty one, andso what ended up happening, Well,
it just so happens that a foamthat was used inside the device to make
(00:49):
it run quieter to limit vibration coulddisintegrate and people could breathe in pieces of
the phone and then it just goeson and on and recall them more than
fifteen million machines. Now, ofcourse they're not claiming liability because they can't.
They can't say it's our fault becausethat screws them for any lawsuit in
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the future. I mean, it'syou've admitted, you've admitted you've done it
wrong. There's no place else togo. There's no defense to that.
So they never admit liability or fault. They just settle the money. They
just settle for the amount of themoney. And that happens all the time.
Just the numbers are getting big.Now. An interesting one is Johnson
and Johnson. This is the ovariancancer case as the against the baby powder,
(01:37):
the TALC that's used by I don'tknow how many millions of women and
men too. It's settling six pointfive billion dollars worth and there are thousands
of lawsuits in the US claiming thatthe talk based products cause ovarian cancer.
Yes, mainly women. I wouldthink very few men get ovarian cancer.
(01:57):
And it's a little common implicated.The deal allows Johnson Johnson to resolve the
lawsuits through a third bankruptcy filing ofa subsidiary company. So this is just
a very complicated case in which effectivelythat division that makes Johnson and Johnson TALC
is going bankrupt and provides a settlementto the court that it can afford,
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and the bankruptcy court says yep,okay, And then there's a three month
voting period for the people that areclaiming and hopefully everybody reaches a consensus.
Okay, So with that, it'slet me tell you about the ovarian cancer
cases. Why is it such anastronomical figure six and a half billion dollars?
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Two reasons. One, there arethousands of people who are making that
claim. Basically, everybody who's everhad or does have or had a family
member die of ovarian cancer and inevitablehas used the Johnson and Johnson product.
So that's virtually everybody. So yougot huge numbers of people. The other
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thing is a couple of them thathave gone to trial. I think of
one that I can think of.The judgment came down over one hundred million
dollars for one person. That's whatthe jury handed out for that one lawsuit.
And all of a sudden, ifone person gets one hundred million dollars
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and there are thousands of people outthere now when you hear about these astronomical
lawsuits and awards, they never havethat way. I mean, the judge
will bring it way down, soyou'll see a couple of million dollars go
out the door. But still ittells these folks. Then when you get
awards that big, maybe you settle, and you settle quickly, let's do
(03:53):
it. Phone calls Hello John,John, you're there, Yes, I'm
here. Can you okay? Yep? I can let me take the speaker
phone that I live in Wacoo,California. A few nights ago, somebody
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stole the car from Portville, Californiaand crashed it into my business. The
people that were driving the car abandonedthe car and left. Thirty minutes later,
the cops came and contacted the ownerof the car, found out was
stolen. The owner of the cardrove from Portaville to get their car.
Can I go after the person whoowns the vehicle for the damage on my
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property? Now? And here's why, because is there's something called intervening acts
that cut off liability. One ofthem is stealing the car. Now,
if it was negligence, that's notmuch. This was a criminal act.
So the answer is no, You'vegot insurance on your home and that's where
(05:00):
you go. Okay, that's theonly thing you do. Yeah, it's
a tough one, but yeah,you could go after the person who did
the driving. But that what areyou to do? All right? You
got someone who gets steals a car, crashes into a building, abandons the
car bails out. Even if thatperson is caught, what do you do
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with that? Do you? Sue? Of course, not even if you
if someone were to get seriously injuredunder those circumstances, there's there's really no
place you can go. Rick,Hello, Rick By, good morning,
Yes, sir, all right,Well, my problem is I went to
(05:44):
write aid to get maderna shot thesecond the booster. They didn't have it.
So they asked me about a flushot and pneumonia went on head and
last night said I didn't remember that. They said, well, we'll give
you one of each. Well Idid that and two years later I got
neuropithy in my feet. Yeah,and you want to know if there's a
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case there, Yes, sure,yeah, that you know those are difficult.
First of all, there is alwaysa percentage of side effects. There's
no such thing as anything without sideeffects. And let's say it's one percent
that no one can do anything about, and that is not negligence on their
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part, It just is. Itjust happens to people, and you may
be in that one percent or halfof percent, and where they may be
at fault is not letting you knowthat there are side effects. So that's
one. Neuropathy is really difficult toprove damages because there are all levels of
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neuropathy. There is neuropathy where okay, I hurt a little bit, and
that's neuropathy up to where people areeffectively disabled, where it is so severe
and it's so subjective. That's theproblem. So how serious is your neuropathy?
(07:13):
It's very serious, I would saymy son, I have one.
Yeah, Okay, I'm not gonnamake the decision. Okay, I got
it. I'm not gonna make thedecision for you. I'm going to suggest
you go to the website for theperson for personal Injury to handle on the
law dot com because they are greatpersonal injury lawyers on there, and and
(07:33):
this is a type of personal injury. I don't think it's going to go
any place. Uh that's my opinion. But I have given bad really,
I have given bad legal advice before. There. I remember there was a
case where someone got into a caraccident and I think it was an Amazon
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or a Coca Cola truck hit themand they lost their arms and legs.
And the thing that was happening isit was ahead on a torso and called
up. Although they couldn't dial sosomeone called up on their behalf and I
said, I don't think there's muchof a case there. I really don't.
And it turned out that one daypassed the statue, they asked someone
else and it turned out there wasa case. If a Coca Cola truck
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does hit you and takes off yourarms and legs, you actually do have
a case. So I don't knowthe answer whether there's a case there or
not. I don't think so,but it's worth going to the website to
find out. Oh yeah, Robert, yello, Robert yo, Robert,
(08:41):
you're there. You know, Idon't know what's going on. I know
we have a delay and sometimes peoplelisten on the radio, so I will,
oh, what were you doing,Robert listening on the radio? Well,
he told me to give you mymiddle name too, and you say
that, okay, got it.Yeah, I don't care about your Yeah.
(09:03):
I don't understand why I needed yourmiddle name, Probably because we just
had a Robert all right, Whatcan I do for you? Robert?
In a in a movie, ifthe dialogue contains like a line from a
song, can you be suit forthat? Uh? If you're talking about
the producer of the movie. Yes, yeah, theoretically, I mean,
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you know, certainly songs have touh there, they have to be copyright
copyrighted in a movie. If usinga song in a movie has to pay
for whatever royalties has to pay forthe ability to use at that song,
uh a dot a line and dota dialogue line. I don't know,
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unless unless it can be attributed tothat movie and it becomes such a noted
piece. Uh. It's it's very, very difficult to say you can't use
a line from a movie. Imean, you know what line are you
talking about? If you can shareit? Why not? This is radio
(10:09):
sore and I can get any troublewith that. Well, No, I
don't have a specific line, justa hypothetical, hypothetical general question. Yeah,
thanks for calling. Yeah, wedon't do that. Gee, if
I've always done this, g Bill, if my grandmother really had nuts,
would she still be my grandmother?Does she know? But I just wanted
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to find out. Mark, Hello, Mark, welcome, Good morning Bill.
Three beneficiaries of a trust, myselfand two siblings. I'm the trustee
of the trust. Now, canwe rearrange the properties and the assets of
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the trust if we have agreement amongstthe three of us. No, because
it's going to be the trust storeor the person who wrote the trust,
who owns the trust, who putthe money in the trust. But it's
mostly assets. It doesn't matter,It doesn't matter, It doesn't matter who's
the trustee. I'm the trustee.You are the trustee. Okay. Now,
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if the trust specifically says you mustdo ABC and D, you generally
have to follow the trust. However, all the beneficiaries get together and say,
here is how we want it distributed. Yeah, I don't even think
the trustee can do that. Ithink the trustee has to in fact follow
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the terms of the trust. Now, as a practical matter, the only
people that can attack that are thebeneficiaries unless someone is coming in from the
outside who is left out of thetrust, or a family member who says
you should have left me in thetrust. If it's not contested, then
there's no issue. Of course,you guys can decide how you're going to
(12:00):
split it up because no one's goingto argue against it. Technically, can
you know? But you know youdo it, and so what no harm,
no foul. So yeah, practicalityas long as no one can test
it, right, no one can. Yeah, as a practicality, if
no one can tests it, allthe beneficiaries on the same side, you
go, yeah, this is whatwe want to do. Now you got
to be a little careful about that, because if that's the case, you
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guys have better get a lawyer andwrite it up. And each individual should
get a lawyer so they understand what'sgoing on, because the last thing that
you want is you change the distributionand the person who comes back later the
beneficiary says, wait a minute,this isn't right, and I really didn't
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understand what I was signing or allowingyou to do unless it goes unless it
goes equally to all three people,and you're just saying we rent this instead
of selling this. But even thenyou can come back. So if everybody's
on the same page one hundred percent, yea, yeah, okay, And
then I would definitely have a lawyerinvolved in writing it out because I think
(13:09):
the potential is not a lot offun. Yeah we're all right, and
okay, we're all there. I'llbuy it fair enough. Let me talk
to you about your business for aminute. And I don't care what business
you're in. I don't know butI'll tell you what I do know about
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(13:33):
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(14:01):
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does. Go to NetSuite dot comslash handle NetSuite as an office. Suite's
NetSuite dot com slash handle. That'sNetSuite dot com slash handle. Timothy,
(14:28):
Hello, Timothy, Bill, Quickquestion about my storage unit. They just
recently put up signs saying if yourcar leak soil. There will be a
charge of one hundred and fifty dollarsfor each occurrence. By accurrence, what
they mean is actual proof of theoil on the pavement. Uh, you're
(14:54):
asking what the word occurrence means.Yeah, well you know that's a great
question. Yeah, no, no, that's that is a terrific question.
And let me tell you how broadthat question is, because it's not just
oil on a driveway in a storageunit. Let me give you the biggest
picture of occurrence that you can imagine. The World Trade Centers, the twin
(15:16):
towers went down nine to eleven.The developers, the owners of the towers,
submitted to the insurance companies for whatthey could cover. The insurance company
said that that attack was one occurrence. That's it. One occurrence. Wow,
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The owner said, it's two occurrencesbecause it was separate planes going into
separate buildings. Do you think theylitigated that one because that was in the
billions of dollars and that wasn't determined. It took the court to determine that.
(15:58):
And by the way, the buildingowned got it because the court said
that it was two different ones.So with that in mind, if it
just says occurrence. Here is whatI'm guessing is that you have the oil
that leaks, and let's say it'sstraightened out and therefore and it leaks again,
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that then it happens again. Andthe argument is that's two occurrences.
Let's say you don't do the cleanup. You just let it drip, drip
drip until such a time as theythrow you out or you decide to leave,
and you haven't repaired it or amelioratedthe problem, and they hit you
for whatever number of occurrents're got.No, that's not true. It's just
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one occurrence. My oil leaked,and it leaked. You decided that you
were going to throw me out oryou were going to clean and charge me
for it, and it kept onleaking. Now you can argue that's all
one occurrence. And unless it isdefined specific you know to me, and
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this may sound kind of stupid,but an occurrence is an occurrence if that
makes it one more one more thing. They have cameras all over and I'm
aware that my car was leaking oil, so I brought a tarp, and
I brought a spray think for oil, and a rag, and I made
sure that I cleaned up whatever oilwas was I what? What? Even
(17:26):
oil that I thought wasn't mine?Okay, because they don't clean they don't
clean up the stains, all right, So what's your question left there?
Well, basically, I guess whatI'm saying. My mistake was driving my
car that I knew leaked oil ontothat lot, knowing those signs are okay.
So again I don't know understand yourquestion on that. Well, my
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question is am I liable for thatone hundred and fifty dollars when they have
proof of me on videos showing thatI that I've cleaned up all my you
know what, whatever dropped? Imean, it was an occurrence. You
know you had an occurrence. Now, the fact that you cleaned it up.
I don't know if that matters becauseit's per occurrence, and then they
can charge you for cleaning it upand you can say, you know,
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maybe an occurrence, but as faras your damages, there was no occurrence.
That's the argument. It's not thatclear cut, and it's actually a
very good question. Who the hellknows. I'm sure people have litigated that
not on that level. Hey,Maria, welcome to handle on the law.
I think hello, yes, yes, okay, Hi, Hi,
(18:30):
I have a question. So thereis a gas station that I usually go
to. Every time I go,there's two different I've been there when there's
two different employees. One of thetimes, well, actually when I go
specifically on Saturday mornings, there isone employee that will not allow me to
do two transactions at a time.Will not allow you to do what hold
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on, will not allow you todo what two transactions at one time.
I don't know what that means.What does that mean? So I go
in and I'll pay for my gas, okay, and then I'll want to
buy something, you know, Okay, I want to go in. Okay,
So they make you pay for thegas, and then they make you
pay separately for whatever you're buying inthere. All right, No no,
(19:15):
no, no, no no,They'll make me pay. She'll make me
pay for my gas, and thenhe'll send me. He'll be like,
you need to go get gas,and then you need to come back to
pay for whatever else you want.But she only does it to wait.
I don't I don't understand. Youpump the gas and you go in.
Well, you're you're paying for thegas with a credit card, so I'm
assuming you pay for it up front, or they let you pay for it
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afterwards. How does that work?Okay, So I'll go in and I'll
pay with because sometimes the machine doesn'twork, or I will go in.
All right, I go in,I pay for my gas, and then
I'll want to get something else,and they don't allow me to do that.
This guy, well, I don'tunderstand. They don't. They don't
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allow you to buy anything else,just the gas. Yes, I have
to get the gas. I haveto go outside pump the gas, and
then I need to go back inand pay for whatever else I want.
Okay, even if there's nobody elseon the store, even if it's just
I don't understand. I don't understandwhat your complaint is. I don't even
(20:22):
understand what happened. You go dothis to men? They do it to
men. No, he does notdo this to men. He only does
this to women. Okay, what'syour question? Is there is there something
that I can do so like?This is gender discrimination? Oh? It
is? And I think sounds tome like a lawsuit worth at least two
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hundred thous because, yeah, becausethey're having cases just like this where they
ask where only men are to payfor gas and to pay for a example,
a candy bar, and they hadto pay for it separately, and
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only women were forced to do that, but men were not. Yeah,
and it's not just a question ofyour damages. It's not just a question
of twenty five cents for the candybar that you have to pay separately.
It is a concept of establishing discrimination. So yes, if I remember the
last case, I think went fora quarter of a million dollars on that.
(21:26):
Oh yeah, no, it wasbig. It was big. So
yes, get hold of a discriminationattorney because you know, yeah, it's
big. Okay. Sometimes I justlove doing this show, truly, I
love it. Carmen, Hello,Carmen, Hi, good morning. Yes,
(21:52):
So my question is can I claimself defense for slapping someone I guess
my ex husband. Yeah, youcan claim self You can claim self defense
for doing anything. But were youdoing this in self defense? Yeah,
he wouldn't give back the baby.That's not self defense. Did he attack
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you? Yes, he was screamingin my face. That doesn't matter.
Did he physically attack you after I, I guess slapped him. Okay,
so you slapped him. You slappedhim because he was screaming and didn't give
you a baby, didn't give youthe baby, which I you know,
that's that's certainly his provocation for me. Uh, but then you slapped him.
(22:38):
Well, you're not going to beable to claim self defense because you
weren't in physical danger, okay,even though I think you have pissed you
off. So the answer is no, you're not going to claim self defense.
But okay, what does he dois did he call the police on
you? Yes? And I wasarrested and sorry, my daughter is cooking
(23:02):
and I was arrested and I'm goingto be charged with misdemeanor of So yeah,
misdemeanors. Yeah, okay, areyou going to be charged based on
what you say? Yeah, you'regonna be I mean, they're not going
to do anything to you. It'llbe a misdemeanor conviction. You're not gonna
do any jail time or anything.That's okay, Yeah, don't worry about
(23:25):
that under those circumstances. But yeah, self defense is not going to fly.
And the only way self defense isgoing to fly is if when he
screamed at you and he raised hisarms at least you interpreted as he was
going to hit you. Then youslapped him I'm not telling you that's what
(23:45):
to do or say because I wasn'tthere. But under those circumstances, that
would be a self defense defense.So yeah, I should have said she's
going to go to jail for twentyyears. It's it's a lot more fun
than that. Bob, Hello,Bob, Hey, how you doing,
Bill? Yes, sir, whatcan I do for you? Yeah,
(24:07):
I've got a question about a Californiarevocable trust. Yes, my brother and
I were both beneficiaries and he passedaway a couple of years ago. Does
his half go to his surviving wifeand son or how does that work?
It depends on how it's written thetrust. It doesn't show them either one
of them on the trust, thenit probably goes to him because what ends
(24:30):
up happening. For example, mytrust is very specific, my family trust.
It goes to the kids, andif one of them dies, it
goes to the other one. Now, if they are married and have kids,
then it goes to the next generation. So if one so basically it
(24:51):
doesn't go to me. It basicallygoes to my brother's surviving wife and son.
Yeah, oh he doesn't go back. Well no, not necessarily,
not necessarily. If it's silent onthat. If it is totally silent,
it doesn't say one way or theother. You've got your brother and you.
You two are the beneficiaries of atrust. Your brother dies first before
(25:15):
the trust. Then it depends whichway the trust is written. Now,
I'm not a trust in a statelawyer, so I don't know if it
is silent, it goes to youor it goes to the heirs. My
guess is it goes to you?If I had to guess. Okay,
now I got another question. Myparents wish to amend the trust. Yeah,
my father basically right now is inhospice care Parkinson's and dementia or whatever,
(25:41):
so he's not really capable. Ismy mother able to that trust?
No? Not by herself, No, no, nope, she doesn't have
the ability to do it by herself. Now, she can do it just
because he's in hospice. But ifhe has dementia doesn't know what to do,
she can get a conservatorship on him. You would need to get a
conservative would or or get a powerof attorney. Yeah, or I think
(26:03):
she would have to get a conservatorship. I know they have it. I
don't know. I don't know ifthat would I don't know if that would
work. But how close? Howclose? Okay, let me make uh
ask quick question. Most trusts thatare written by married couples, if one
dies, the other one gets everythingcorrect. Okay, So with that,
(26:26):
how close is your dad to dine? Probably within six months? She you
just she just you just wait,you know, yeah, you just wait.
That's the easiest way. You justwait until your dad, you know,
pops off. It's so it's notit's not worth talking to a trust
attorney. Now, I wouldn't.No, I wouldn't. I wouldn't and
(26:48):
I'm not even yeah, I'm noteven gonna suggest. I'm not even to
suggest you kill your dad because youdon't have to, right, right,
right, So you're fine. Yeah, then that's by far the easiest way
to go, because then you knowyou are trust an attorney. You trust
attorney that goes you know, thewhole bunch. Uh yeah, Nancy,
Hi, Nancy, welcome, Hi, Hi Bill. Question about an emergency
(27:15):
room visit where I knew I neededstitches, requested stitches. They wouldn't do
it, and it's when the glueand the tape fell off. It's terrible
scarring. The Scarring is terrible.Scarring is terrible. Lots here the glue.
Yeah, let me let me askyou this. Had they done stitches,
(27:38):
had they given you stitches, itwould have looked a lot better,
right, it would have been itbled for three days also, and it
wouldn't have done that. Here's thehere's here's the problem. First of all,
it's on your hand correct or ona finger. No, it's on
my face. It's on your face. Yes, okay, is there scarring?
(28:02):
Oh? Yes, okay, Nancy, you can stop right there.
You what it is when you're talkingabout scarring on your face and there's a
medical situation. What they should havedone is even brought in a plastic surgeon.
Uh to do I requested. Idid request that, Bill. Okay,
(28:22):
Well that that that helps your yourcase? All right, I'm going
to suggest that you want to goto handle on the law dot com and
they're going to refer you to amedical malpractice attorney. I mean you,
there's there is an issue there.And let me ask you another very practical
question. How good looking are you? Be? Honest, I think I'm
(28:44):
good looking. Yes. One ofthe reasons you're probably not as good looking
as you say you are. Butyeah, probably not. But but but
let me tell you, the thebetter looking you are, the strong the
cases. Strangely enough, that's notthat strange. I mean, if you're
incredibly ugly and you're in front ofa jury, they're gonna go. Yeah.
(29:07):
Matter of fact, you look betterwith a scar on your face than
you did before. But it's it'sstill a very solid case. And obviously
I'm, you know, being alittle bit facetious with you, but yeah,
that's the case. That is acase. How big is the scar?
I mean you describe the scar fora shit, It goes through the
eyebrow about half an inch above.Okay, all right, yeah, there's
(29:30):
there's a there there there is Goto the website. I will do that.
Yeah, go to handle it alot dot com. Yeah, okay,
that is sure that Actually you knowI got scarred my arm, my,
Lena, let's say your hand,you have a scar unless you're a
hand model, I mean, whocares, right or on your arm okay,
(29:55):
not a big deal. But onyour face that changes everything. It
truly does. All right, Alittle bit about your bad breath, my
bad breath. If you were tosmell me, I don't care. If
I have bad breath, well sometimesI do. And what works well,
you can suck on a mint,okay, it works for a little while.
(30:15):
Or you can use a Zelman's mintyMouth mint. And here you suck
on the minty Mouth mint. Ithas mint on the outside, but it's
partially seed oil on the inside,and it goes into your gut and really
gets to work after you swallow it, because so much bad breath comes from
inside your gut with the foods thatyou eat. Now you're talking about really
(30:37):
good clean breath, not just coveringup your breath, but it cleans your
breath. You suck on the capsule, you swallow it, you can bite
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(31:00):
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S Zelmans dot com. And beforeI leave once again, I am going
(31:25):
to continue taking phone calls off theair for future broadcasts, and so I
know there are a few people onhold, stay put. I will get
to you just in a matter ofjust a second or two, and you
can also call in now or withinthe next half hour, and there's no
problem. I will answer your callsand quickly I might add no brakes eight
(31:49):
hundred five two zero one five threefour eight hundred five two zero one five
three four. This is handle onthe law