Awesome. And welcome into another episode of
Vision Pros Live. I'm your show host, Jackson
Callum, founder and CEO of First Class Business.
And we got Danny Caron in the house. This guy
is the lovable lawyer. And I grilled him to make
sure that that was true. We had a very, very
tough first conversation. I was still lovable
when we were finished with it too. You were the
whole time. Even throughout the hard questions.
I've handled worse. I've handled a lot worse.
Have you handled worse in the podcast industry?
Uh, yeah. Trying to live in with lawyers for
35 years. No, no, I'm saying I'm saying in the
podcast industry, has any hosts been more, more
difficult? No, you're, you're a pain in the ass.
Awesome. And so, my friends, this is so important
to me. Your lives, your visions, you've got to
have the right types of people coming in. And
I want my professionals to come in and deliver
when they get to come into this particular opportunity
where they're talking about a specific topic.
We're going to be diving into the business mistakes
that are signs of a victim mentality. And don't
turn this off thinking that you're free of a
victim mentality, my friends. We are going to
expose some things and help us all realize that
instead of saying, you know what, I'm not a victim,
maybe we could... start looking at, well, wait
a second, in what ways do I show up as a victim?
Because I think all of us have a tendency to,
in some area or another, fall into that reality.
And we're going to talk about legally protecting
yourself. We're going to talk about how to bolster
your business as well. Danny's right there and
in the act of building his own brand out as well.
And so Danny, let's start with your vision. Tell
us about your vision first, and then we'll dive
into some of the specifics. My vision for what?
Boy, I got a lot of visions. My vision concerns
this brand and what we're doing is really to
make it take off as everybody's vision is when
they're kind of in this social media self -help
wellness space. But I'm promoting something that
I've not seen out there. There's all this wellness
content out there. You take a look at the daytime
landscape and internet landscape and you see
a bunch of emotional wellness content out there
like Dr. Phil going on about being safe in your
mind and body. There's a lot of financial wellness
content out there. Jim Cramer, Susie Orman, talking
about how to set up a 529 for your kids or a
401k for yourself. But where it concerns that
third essential wellness bucket, legal, which
by the way, when it tips, it spills into the
other two because you freak out and you go broke.
There's really nothing there. And I want to fill
that space by delivering legal wellness in a
free, fun, and friendly way. in a way that people
deserve but don't get because the law is a right
and not a privilege reserved only for folks who
can afford expensive lawyers and if we don't
understand the law it doesn't serve its highest
purpose in calling because we can't use it to
our benefit people just kind of ignore it and
don't know about it or somewhere in between my
vision is to deliver legal wellness in an accessible
way where people can feel good and confident
about themselves legally as they do physically
emotionally and financially I have been through
the ringer legally myself. We're not going to
turn this into my episode today, but y 'all can
find that on other episodes. I want to focus
on why it's so helpful and why this paradigm
matters. Years ago, traveling was only for the
wealthiest of the wealthy. Years ago, getting
a financial advisor was only the wealthiest of
the wealthy. Getting access to the internet and
higher education was only for the wealthy. My
friends, times are changing. It is very important
to realize you can actually unlock access to
new things that Maybe your friends and family
are uncomfortable with, but that doesn't make
it wrong. That just puts you ahead. So make sure
to get ahead in this. We're going to talk about
it again, the business mistakes that are signs
of a victim mentality. Before we cut to a break,
we're going to dive in a little bit. First, hot
and heavy. So in business, the mindset, you can
ask Dan Martell. You can ask Richard Branson,
great leaders. Your mindset can either protect
you or quietly sabotage everything that you're
building and everyone that you're building with.
Let's talk about that first to break down the
legal and mental mistakes that are hurting entrepreneurs
the most. What would you say some of those are,
Danny? What things are holding us back mentally?
I think the biggest thing is just not appreciating
what you don't know. We always say you don't
know what you don't know. But boy, you really
got to appreciate that there's so much stuff
out there that you don't know as it concerns
business. So I'm an attorney. I've got my own
law firm. I've had it for. 20 some years. I had
my own firm with some other guys for another.
But Danny on Forbes, I read an article that said,
these are the seven steps to win in business.
I mean, like, shouldn't that be it? Listen, I'm
no sucker for steps. I'm more nuanced than that.
And my point was going to be that, Hey, listen,
you stay in your lane is really kind of the lesson.
I don't know from business law. I know. class
action law. I know consumer protection law. I
know antitrust. I know this much about securities,
but I don't know how to start a business. I don't
know how to write a partnership agreement or
a corporate charter. I don't know how to incorporate,
well, incorporating yourself isn't so hard, but
there are a lot of things that I just don't know.
And what they say, do you know what they say
about a lawyer who represents himself? What is
that? He has a fool for a client and I don't
want to be that fool. So where it concerns anything
business related for me, I talk to my lawyer.
I don't do anything. And I haven't for 12 years
without talking to my lawyer first and getting
his guidance. Even if it turns out I'm right,
I want that peace of mind. So as it concerns
copyright issues or incorporation issues or relationships
with co -counsel sometimes, I just need to put
it. to somebody else to get some guidance. And
what I'm trying to do, you see is offer folks
like a DIY law degree. You don't need to necessarily
pay for lawyer. If that is you listen to me,
if you buy my book, if you take a look at and
pay mind to some lessons that I relate to folks
in an accessible way so that they can, you can
handle these things to some degree on your own,
not entirely. Sometimes you do need a lawyer.
If you're in a car crash, you don't want to litigate
it yourself, but there's some steps you want
to initiate on your own before you get a lawyer.
That's in here. That's really my biggest, most
important admonition of all. Not what you don't
know, but that you don't know a lot of stuff.
I really appreciate it. So many business owners
ignore the CLO. They don't have a chief legal
officer. They don't even think about that department.
And it is unfortunate when you get to a point
where you need it. And you didn't prepare. It's
better to prepare and prevent than repair and
repent. I will also double down on what Danny
said about hiring yourself as your own lawyer.
As an entrepreneur, my friends, this is a very
important quote that stood the test of time.
And it is absolute power corrupts absolutely.
And you may think that it only applies to politicians.
But in reality, as a business owner. If the buck
stops with you and you don't have any checks
and balances in place, you don't have any team
members that can challenge your authority. You're
the one who makes all the decisions and there's
nobody who can override your veto process. you're
going to fall into a very dark and difficult
reality sooner than later. So what we're saying
is instead, just protect yourself, bring the
right people in. Don't feel like you have to
do all of this on your own. You do need great
people by your side in order to create great
visions. So we're going to come back. We're going
to talk about, go ahead, Danny, you're burning,
you're burning. I wouldn't fix my own car. I
wouldn't fix my own furnace. I wouldn't fix my
own body when I'm sick. You see specialists for
all that stuff. See a lawyer. or to the extent
you can handle stuff on your own because you
can make quick fixes i just got some new allen
wrenches i fixed i tried to fix the uh door on
the shower couldn't do it but there's some things
you can do on your own that's where my counseling
and guidance come in but for the bigger ticket
items let me tell you there's no uh there's no
substituting for an expert whether it be a doctor
a mechanic earn as it concerns our conversation
a lawyer Nailed it. And we're again, we're going
to connect these business mistakes to victim
mentality so that we can pull you out of the
victim mentality and help you run your business
as a great visionary. All right. Welcome in to
Vision Pros Live with Jackson Callum. I'm your
show host. We'll be doing interviews for visionary
entrepreneurs and guest leaders who are building
fantastic visions out there. Hey guys, again,
welcome in to Vision Pros Live. I'm your show
host, Jackson Callum, founder and CEO of First
Class Business. And I'm truly excited to have
Danny Caron. We're going to be using his time
as well as possible. I'm going to go super fast
through some extra resources, but we want to
make sure that he's able to get out on his date
with his lovely wife. This is super important
to me, guys. Family comes before business. Business
is important, but balance is so important too.
And so never forget that, please, as you build
your own dynasties or legacies. Sponsors, real
quick. AI Mavericks. AI Mavericks is a program
that I pay to be part of because I want to be
part of an audience of world -class AI experts,
mastermind and scene. Well, what do they see
today that I don't? Because this stuff's moving
fast, my friends. You want as many of these people
by your side as you can get. So Austin Armstrong,
somebody I met personally at Social Media Marketing
World last year, and I was super impressed at
how intentional and on point and like. authentically
genuine he was during the whole time that he
was with us. In addition to that, not only was
he just present for that, then I found out about
Scott Simpson, who was launching AI Mavericks.
So then I spent the year watching what they were
doing, tagging my team members on the different
projects and seeing just how he could handle
the heat of my. I ask tough questions. I'll just
put it that way. And we had some battles about
AI back and forth, and I cannot speak highly
enough about what they've built with AI Mavericks.
They're doing super advanced stuff like creating
agents and basically training AI to take over
job positions and stuff like that, that allows
the people who do those positions to upgrade
to things AI cannot do. Then we have the AI marketplace.
What? Two of them? And one's owned by me? Yes,
you're right. Why? Because I believe in collaboration
and in abundance. And I know that all of you
out there right now, you have the expertise that
AI needs. And that's not going to go anywhere
anytime soon. But you may not know how to talk
about it in an interview. And you may not know
how your skill sets translate for your resume
and for your LinkedIn. And so for the professional
track, this helps you understand how to utilize
AI to belong in the upcoming workforce. And on
the business side, how to track down what are
my bottlenecks? business. They're applicable
in today's world that can actually be fixed.
And my friends, most business owners are putting
AI into their business in ways that is absolutely
ruining their reputation. Like RingCentral. I'll
call them out today. I tried to cancel my service
to them today, but guess what? I got stuck in
between AI hotlines and AI chats and nothing
was moved forward. I have to try again tomorrow.
I will never go back to RingCentral because of
how abysmal their customer support is right now.
That's a multi -billion dollar company that is
screwing up AI. We are not better. than multi
-billion dollar companies my friends so we need
to be extra careful about how do we use these
tools to create productivity and profitability
for ourselves and that's exactly what we teach
on this our founding memberships are going for
fifty dollars a month or five hundred dollars
lifetime access you have to pay yearly on that
come and join us as a founding member get ahead
of the curve and help us open the doors for others
the last thing i'll say about it my friends is
that we have a grant program for any of you that
cannot afford or don't want to want don't want
to pay for up front because you want to see the
value first just click the grant program apply
through that system commit to the five steps
that we ask you to do on a regular basis in order
to own that grant just like a great scholarship
i want everybody to be involved in this i don't
want anybody left behind in the new world of
ai then there's the water project my friends
all of us have access to water if you're listening
to this podcast right now i have a feeling you
have a cup of water near you these people don't
there are millions of people who go without clean
drinking water every day. There are kids out
there who have to leave school to get it for
their... for their school's parents who have
to leave work to get water. You can imagine what
type of jeopardy that might put them with their
careers. We have an opportunity to step in and
help. And even if you give $10 to $20 to this
project, you actually get to see that project
come to fruition and you may bless the lives
of 500 plus people for generations. This is an
amazing opportunity to help out. And lastly,
my friends, there are 8 billion people in this
world. If you know of a cause that you'd like
to see us support, do us a favor. Let's create
a battle in the comments. Drop your cause there.
Let me take a look at it. I'll personally look
at it and if we can contribute. who we will,
or I'll possibly even talk about it on this show.
But like I said, we got 8 billion people to help
bring it back to helping every single one of
you right now with Danny Karen himself. So Danny,
again, thanks for joining me here and thanks
for being the lovable lawyer. Actually, I'm your
lovable lawyer versus the article V, a distinction
with a big difference. You know why? Because
I'm personal to you. I'm not just out there.
I want you to feel like my guidance is something
you can use and it's designed to help you and
your problems because your problems matter. They
matter to me and they should matter to you. And
I want to collaborate with you to make your life
better. That's the whole basis for the brand.
Do I need a contract and an agreement before
I can claim that myself? You know, let me talk
to my mom. Very good. Fun game. And I really
like the personalization on it and just the way
that you show up. So we're going to move into
this super fast ending because, again, I got
to get you out the door. Did you hear my wife
on the phone when I told her it would be an hour?
I said, you know what? I know how important it
is. How cool is it when as entrepreneurs we can.
Under promise and over deliver, right? So let's
over deliver on this one on both fronts. So from
overlooked contracts to unnecessary communication
mistakes, our conversation is going to highlight
the habits that separate resilient leaders from
those who unknowingly put their business at risk.
So let's talk there first. Overlooked contracts
and unnecessary communication mistakes. What
pops up most often? Nobody reads their contracts.
You know they don't. You don't. I often don't.
All you got to do is download an app and you
scroll through all this stuff and then you hit
accept. Thing is, they designed the process so
that you don't read what they're binding you
to. It's one thing to scroll through and click.
That's called a scroll through agreement. Worse
yet, more sinister is a click through agreement.
We have to click each page because when you get
screwed and you go back and try to sue them and
they say you can't because you acceded to, you
accepted every page. Why? Because I have a click
response for every single page. And that's not
what I meant by that. Well, that's why they do
it. And the thing is, they bury all the bad stuff,
of course, in what you don't read. Most notably,
liability waivers. Those are the clauses, the
language that say, hey, listen, if we hurt you,
we're not on the hook. You're self -pay. I'll
give you an example. I'm getting a little feedback.
Are you all right? You're good. Yeah, keep going.
This is the book, too. This case involves Richard
Corwin. Corwin was a guy in New York City who
rented a bike in the middle of Manhattan at one
of those bike share facilities. And to rent the
bike, he had to sign up through the app. Click,
click, click. He signs up. Fine. He goes, he
gets the bike. He takes the bike away from the
station, hits a curb immediately, takes a header,
cracks his head open, and he's in the hospital.
He ends up suing New York Bike Share, claiming,
hey, listen, your facility was poorly configured.
There shouldn't have been a curb there. You were
negligent. And for that reason, I want you to
pay for my injuries. New York Bike Share defended
on the basis of, in the text that he accepted,
there's a liability waiver that says, hey, listen,
for gross negligence, meaning like really bad,
like we saw you come in and we put our foot out
and tripped you kind of thing, that we're not
off the hook for. But for ordinary negligence,
like you're alleging, you know what? That's on
you. Now, you might wonder, what could he have
done to change that? Well, nothing. If you wanted
to rent from Manhattan Bike Share or Midtown
Bike Share or wherever, it's going to have that
same language, no different than if you sign
up for cell phone service from AT &T, T -Mobile,
or Verizon. They all have the same language in
them. Believe me, you can't change it. That's
called an adhesion contract. Take it or leave
it. He could have gotten a scooter. He could
have taken the subway. He could have walked.
He could have driven, God forbid. He wanted a
bike. So what do you do? You rent the bike. So
he can't change it. So you might be thinking,
okay, so then why are you even wasting my time,
Danny, describing these contracts if what's in
them is in them? How's that going to change?
What's going to change even had I read it? I'll
tell you what would have changed for me had I
been him is that had I seen that I was going
to be self -paid for $100 ,000 in damages, lost
work, other consequential damages related to
your head injury, if I were to take a header.
What would I have done differently? I don't want
a helmet. You can do a lot of things to build
into the language that you can't avoid. What
ended up happening for him? He lost, as you'd
expect. because the language is in there not
all states are going to side with the company
some are more liberal they side with the victim
you would have thought if anybody in new york
would but no even in new york he lost so people
don't read their contracts they don't know what
to expect they don't take proper precautions
based on what language is in them to the extent
they can change them they don't even try to none
of these options are good read your contracts
My friends, a lot of us are thinking, I don't
have time to read those contracts. And that right
there is our first blind spot of victim mentality.
We all have 24 -7, right? We all have 24 hours
in a day. We've all got the ability to go into
it. Now, you might think, you might be hurt and
be like, well, Jackson, I can't afford to do
that. I'm really sorry for the entrepreneurs
that have put themselves in that situation. It
sucks. You still did it. You were the adult.
You can't afford to read their contracts. You're
in business as part of doing business. I'll give
you another example. This is a personal one,
but same theme. My son is renting an apartment
in Washington, D .C. He just graduated college,
and I read his lease. He didn't read the lease.
Why kids don't read leases? Never mind. There's
nothing I'm going to tell you that's going to
make a kid read a lease. I read the lease. My
mom can tell you, kick them out of the house
and let them figure it out on their own. Well,
you know what? Kids have to grow up, and they're
not going to grow up if, as parents, we don't
let them. But I didn't. I read the lease anyway.
And what I noticed is there's a 60 -day notice
provision for not wanting to renew. So I said,
Morgan, my son, let's calendar 60 days out from
the expiration of the lease because if you don't
want to renew it, you better tell your landlord.
Otherwise, you're going to have to pay some prorated
part of the number of days for which you didn't
give notice. What ended up happening to a couple
of buddies of his when they were all in school
was they had the same. no, I'm sorry. This happened
to him. There was a 30 day notice provision in
his last lease. I didn't read it. And when they
gave notice, they gave notice like two days before
the lease expired. And the landlord came back
and said, you owe me 28 days. And you know what
they did. And that was because they didn't, I
didn't read the contract. Listen, man, I do that
stuff too. We all got to do our best to protect
ourselves. And that is an easy way. Absolutely.
And all of us kids that are university age or
older, it's like grow up. Let's get out of the
victim mentality. It's on us to do it. If we
also wait until day 60 and something happens
on day 60, welcome back to victim mentality.
You should have planned ahead and started on
day 50, right? Make sure not to put yourself
in a position where you can end up missing out
on those. I'm going to go into one more victim
mentality. So when we were running Restaurant
Connect, for instance, a lady came up to us at
a trade show and said, I'm Restaurant Connect
too. And then she went and she applied for the
trademark. of the company well we had the business
longer um and so we decided to fight that in
court and twenty thousand dollars later that
we didn't have as a startup we won um and we
got to keep restaurant connect my friends that
is not a victory if you don't have twenty thousand
dollars to dedicate towards a situation like
that don't be a victim just change your brand
name There's plenty of names out there. You don't
have to go to war over it. And when Apple patented
our software, we were not a victim mentality.
At first, we were. I spent about three hours
looking at, holy crap, Apple just patented everything
that we've built. And somehow they built things
that we hadn't thought of. And they love to do
this to companies. Well, after the three -hour
panic attack and wondering if I was going to
have a heart attack, I just realized, you know
what? I'm never going to win against Apple anyway.
I just need to make my next phone call. And I
jumped right back on the phones and started to
go back to work. So instead of being a victim
and giving up my company, giving up my dreams,
we decided to just keep building. And I'm really
grateful that we did that. Will I be in prison
someday, Danny? I don't know. But I know that
I'm grateful that I fought for what we had built
and decided that in that circumstance, we had
made some stupid decisions as startup people.
And we did not have the backing and funding to
bring in yet another lawyer in this reality.
But that's another lesson for all of us to learn.
I'm not being a victim about it and saying, oh,
poor me. I wish that I, no, no, no. You just
got to own it. Sometimes you have to own your
mistakes. You know, it wasn't a criminal offense.
You didn't violate the criminal code. You won't
wind up in jail. You might get sued. I don't
do IP, intellectual property work. That's something
I go to my lawyer for. With all the social media
stuff I'm doing and brand -related stuff I'm
doing, I mean, I talk to him about everything.
Now, let me offer this, by the way, you know,
we're talking about a victim mentality. Here's
here's another way of considering the whole victim
mentality concept. Not so much as preventive
where you want to avoid becoming a victim by
being prepared. But when something happens to
you, being proactive is one thing to be prepared.
It's another to be proactive. So, for instance,
this is in the book, too. A friend of mine got
a crown on his tooth and he comes home from the
dentist and the crown falls off. He calls me
up. What do I do? I'm a dentist. What do you
mean? You know, should I pay him? Should I go
back? I said, should you pay him? Did you pay
him already? Didn't you? Yeah, I put on my visa.
I said, first thing you do is you call visa and
you stop payment. Then you send him a letter
and you say, I want this thing fixed and you're
going to accommodate me somehow, whether it's
price or convenience or whatever. He freaks out.
He says, oh, no, you know what? Like, I don't
want to get in trouble with the guy. I don't
want things to go sideways. I don't want him
to send my, you know, build a collection. I said,
oh my God, you cannot have this victim mentality.
You did nothing wrong. You got to stand up for
yourself. I'll tell you the first thing doctors,
first and last thing doctors don't want is a
medical malpractice case. You threaten anything
in that space, they freak out. You let them know
you're going to sue them. You better fix this
damn thing. And you're not going to pay him anywhere
near what he asked for. You're going to have
him talking and dealing with you on your terms.
I'm going to play angel's advocate a little bit
though, Danny, on this. I'm going to play angel's
advocate. Is it okay to like - Whatever kind
of advocate you want. Is it first okay to talk
to the dentist and be like, hey, can we fix this?
I said send a letter. You know what? I said send
a letter. He could call and talk to him for sure.
I wonder whether I recommended that. I don't
know that I did. I think I was kind of pissed
off for some reason at the time. I don't know
what I did, but I always try to talk first before
escalating things. You're absolutely right. So
let's say they talk and it worked out fine. Let's
say they talked and it didn't. Then you put it
in writing. So let's go that route. Okay. You
put it in writing. You need a record. And the
last thing they want is to get sideways with
a patient because you got. a malpractice case.
You got the state medical board or dental board,
I guess it's called, whatever it's called, and
on and on over a nothing, nevermind fee. What
ended up happening was the dentist put on a temporary,
gave him his money back. He went to another dentist,
got it fixed better for half the price because
he refused to be a victim. And he said to me,
you know, the minute you told me I can stand
up for myself and be proactive and take my life
and matters and justice into my own hands is
the minute i felt a lot better and it worked
out for him so don't let this stuff you know
get your goat you don't have it can it can it
can it can be hard to because the emotions behind
it we got i was very blessed and fortunate when
my last daughter was born um blessed in a lot
of ways. She survived the hospital experience.
Mama survived the hospital experience, but it
was an absolute nightmare. And we didn't have
insurance because she was from Mexico and we
got stuck in the United States due to COVID.
Long story. It was a train wreck of an experience,
but we were going to have a bill of over $300
,000. But they did such an awful job that by
the time day three rolled around, the CEO had
already written us a letter apologizing, waived
all fees, everything. We didn't even have to
communicate about it. Oh, my God. I remember
thinking like, I have a feeling they know that
we could have sued the living crap out of this
hospital. I don't know that they do the right
thing out of the goodness of their heart. Sometimes
that happens. It's usually financial. You know
what? It's not worth the money to. really hold
their ground. A few years ago, my wife was right
here where we are. I'm in Florida. I'm going
to limit you to two minutes on this one because
I know we've got to get you out of here. No,
we're good. We're going to make this happen.
I'm going to give you two minutes for this story.
We still have a couple of topics to get to. I
will not say who was at fault. We'll leave it
at that. She ended up crashing our new car. Total
loss. Other car, total loss. Some injuries. Lawyers
get involved. By the time you add it up, you're
talking about two cars, $100 ,000. Injury is
$150 ,000. That's $250 ,000. Lawyers, another
$300 ,000, $350 ,000 swing, right? The insurance
company, when we made a claim, said, you're not
covered. We're denying your claim. You've got
to be kidding me. I'm like, why? And they gave
me some half -baked reason, didn't hold up. And
I had to take matters into my own hands. Even
though I'm the lawyer, I had to represent myself.
Why? Because number one, no contingency fee lawyer
is going to take the case on a, you know, pay
me one third of find coverage. That's not even
a thing. And no hourly lawyer. I couldn't afford
it. 500 bucks an hour. I'm upside down like you
described earlier. So I had to do it myself.
I got on my forensic course and reconstructed
the facts. I got. the lease. I got the email
chain. I got the cell phone records. I got the
odometer statement. I got everything I could
and needed to build a story. I put together an
eight -page letter supported by 13 exhibits,
sent it in, waited four weeks, heard nothing.
I was about to file a federal complaint in federal
court when they called and said two things. One,
they said, you're covered. And two, they said,
we're sorry for what we put you through. The
letter was that compelling. So, you know what?
I could have taken it and gone personally bankrupt
or really pushed. And I like to say adversity
really makes you helpless in that you have no
choice but to succeed. And that's what happened.
And that's what I did. And you got to self -advocate.
I appreciate that a lot. Now we put in here why
say less and read more is a powerful business
strategy. We also have in here how better habits
can protect our business relationships and reputation.
Let's start first with the say less and read
more. What's that all about? My grandma used
to always tell me you can't go wrong with your
mouth shut. I mean, there's so many ways to get
into trouble these days. These defamation cases
are epidemic and they're massive. I mean, they're
not nickel and dime cases anymore. I mean, look
at like Alex Jones got sued for the Sandy Hook
thing for like a billion dollars. Donald Trump
got sued several times for multi tens of millions
of dollars and on and on and on. with the with
the you know the fox voting news with the voting
systems and everything so it's really stupid
to pop off if you don't know the facts and more
so if you don't know the law that you're taking
refuge in to support what you say look at a couple
of years ago on campus with all the gaza israel
protests kids were saying thinking they could
say what they want when they wanted for however
long they wanted to whomever they wanted about
whomever and they could take refuge in the first
amendment i'll bet you anything 99 out of 100
kids didn't know what the First Amendment said
much as where to find it. Maybe they chat GPT
and that's about it. But you know what? The First
Amendment doesn't allow you to say and support
your saying whatever you want, whenever you want.
It's got limitations. A lot of them, obscenities,
fighting words, defamation, and so on. It doesn't
apply to private institutions like private schools.
They only adopt the First Amendment's requirements
because they're bastions of higher learning.
They want to kind of play and look the part,
as you would expect. They don't have to. That's
why restaurants can say no shoes, no shirt, no
service. Because they can say whatever the hell
they want. It's a private entity. And so long
as they're not discriminating against a protected
class, they can do it. And kids say that stuff
all the time. I'll tell you, the person who would
have benefited a ton from having this much legal
wellness as a concerned, virginia defamation
law was amber heard because her case with johnny
depp sometimes she goes out ai coming in yeah
right right yeah i don't know what i said uh
amber alexa and i'm kind of close so um it was
a spouse it was a not a spousal abuse case it
was a defamation case and had she known what
not to say under virginia common law with the
elements of the defamation claim are there which
she had no clue about i'm sure of it as many
of us most of us don't in our respective states
she would have not said what she did and she'd
have been up anywhere it's projected between
10 and 12 million dollars where did popinoff
get her i understand her message and it's an
important one but damn i'm telling you if you
are walking into something like an op -ed published
in the washington post .com without any aptitude
for the law Having talked to your lawyer, and
I don't know whether she did or didn't, but if
she did, boy, did she get the wrong advice, then
you're doing yourself a real disservice. You
cannot go wrong with your mouth shut. Now, I
just saw an article or video on your website,
and it looks like you cover some really, really
cool and important and pointful topics that you're
probably going to be king of TikTok at some point.
Which ones have I got from your mouth? There's
a topic on there about wage theft and are you
a victim of it. And on the business owner side
as well, Let's dive into communication a little
bit. What are some of the things that the mistakes
from a communication standpoint that a business
owner can make with team members, clients, et
cetera? What are some of the most common ones
that they don't realize that they're walking
into? Well, you know, if you don't communicate
with your employees, if you're not honest with
them, if you don't give them the documents and
data that you required to give them by the state,
by the BWC, Bureau of Workers' Comp, by Paychex
or whatever, payroll provider you're using, you
could be in real trouble. It's so easy just to
kind of gloss over things. If you pull tips and
take part of the tips as an employer, can't do
that. You're going to walk into a wage and hour
claim, a fair labor standard practices claim.
I mean, you just don't want to do that. Know
the law, talk to your lawyer, talk to an employment
lawyer and find out what the rules of the road
are as it concerns interacting with your employees,
what your duties and obligations are to them
and their duties and obligations are to you because
it's a two -way street. Very, those are a lot
of really, really powerful examples. Very fast.
I'm trying. I love it, man. And so the, those
business owners as well, you got, what about
an independent contractor? You talked about employees.
Well, an independent contractor. My son is a
DJ. So he's an independent contractor. His employer
has to make sure that he's paid for the work
he performs. And if he's not, My son has every
right to pursue a claim for wage theft. Now,
I don't want to recommend that he do that. He's
got a great gig. It's going just fine. But you
got to be really careful as somebody hiring independent
contractors too. And you got to, for your part,
you want to provide them W -9s to ensure that
you don't pay taxes on the wages you pay them.
That's an important thing. And as a young person
who's an independent contractor, I've had to
counsel my son as to what that means because
he's learning about tax issues for the first
time, especially now. it being tax season. He's
like, I'm getting paid. Can I keep it all? I'm
like, no, you can't. You got to put, we literally
had this talk yesterday. So you got to squirrel
X. I said, take a third just to be on the safe
side, put it aside into a tax account. So come
tax season, if you owe money taxes on your W
-9 income, you'll have it available rather than
getting caught flat footed. Nobody wants to be
caught short come April 15th every year. Right.
And now diving into that same topic, if I'm a
business owner and I hire an agency, are they
considered team members and employees? Are they
considered independent contractors? And again,
are there communication mistakes that occur in
that field? I've hired document reviewers. My
cases are so big that they require lots of bodies
to look at documents. These are typically antitrust
cases, federal antitrust class action cases.
routinely hire independent contractors through
agencies, and I treat them the exact same way.
So you treat an agency like an independent contractor?
I pay the agency. I don't pay the worker. The
agency pays the worker, but I pay the agency.
Now, how the agency interacts with their independent
contractor, I'm not sure because that's not my
space. Whether they treat them as an employee
or an independent contractor, I don't know. I
just know that my independent contractors tend
to come through agencies and I interact with
the agency. So do you then send the W -9 to the
agency? Yes, I do. And I do all my payroll and
payment processing, so to speak, with the agency.
I would never pay the document reviewer personally.
That's just not the arrangement. As we wrap up,
Danny, talk to me about your book. And again,
back to that part of the vision of what you're
doing to help people get legal protection and
not fall victim of fear, not fall victim of ignorance
as well and realize that they can protect themselves.
What's your bigger vision for moving it forward?
Ultimately, what I'd like to do, what drives
this whole process, and this is a really big
ask, and I'm not sure I'm even asking it of,
is I'd really love to turn this brand and this
product and this cause and this goal and this
undertaking and effort into a talk show. I really
want to become the legal Dr. Phil. There's nobody
Phil in that lane. The only legal related...
Not even wellness. Legal -related content on
TV. Are those ginned -up courtroom shows that
are more exploitative than they are preventive
and helpful in that they prey on people's misery
and misfortune and train the cameras on people
after things have fallen apart? My goal is to
move the dial back and give people the tools
they need and deserve to avoid stepping in it.
so that they're not the ones in litigation because
people say, oh, you know what? I'll just defend
on whatever basis. Let me tell you, it's not
so easy. Once you're defending, you're in court
and it stinks. You want to keep out of court.
That's what you want to do. My lawyer that I've
talked to about already, he once said to me that
he had a client who wanted a real aggressive
SOB, the meanest lawyer he could find. And he
asked my lawyer if he was it. And my lawyer said
to him, words I've come to live by, my lawyer
said to him, you know what? If you want a real
SOB lawyer who's going to take you right up to
the line, then I'm not your guy. Because my job
is to keep you as far away from the line as possible.
And that's what this book does is it concerns
people's legal wellness. Keeps them away from
the line, keeps them as safe as possible. Oh,
I love that. My brother a long time ago when
I was little told me a story about three truck
drivers who were asked about this dangerous curve.
And the first two bragged about how close they
could get to the curve and not fall off the edge.
The other one came in and said, I wouldn't even
dare come close to that edge. Naturally, he's
the one who got the job. Same type of thing.
Absolutely. I appreciate your perspective and
paradigm on that. Okay, then last and final opportunity
for tonight. If this is the last chance you have
to provide counsel, wisdom, encouragement to
visionaries that are in this world, what would
the counsel be? Oh, boy. I don't mean to sound
self -serving, but you know what? If you want
a nice dose of legal wellness. It's not expensive.
It's much cheaper than a lawyer. And not just
to counsel you, but to get you out of trouble
if you step in it, then I've got chapters on
all these evergreen topics, whether what to do
in an auto accident, liability waivers like we
talked about, forced arbitration, which is where
companies strip you of your Seventh Amendment
right to a jury trial when something happens
and put you in this black box process where you
lose 97 plus percent of the time the data show,
and on and on and on. 300 pages worth of good
stuff that's accessible, that's easy to read,
that's in audio if you like to listen to books,
and that will keep you legally as safe as possible
without having to pay for an expensive lawyer.
My friends, you can tell from the thickness of
that book that Danny's heart and soul. went into
this thing. And so I don't mind you making a
plug for that at all because you spent a lifetime
preparing yourself to put everything together
like that. And it's not like a book from a coach
that I don't have to worry about liabilities
as a business owner. I can publish a book and
half of it could be just trash. I wouldn't get
in trouble for publishing that book. Yours has
consequences if you don't do that book well.
And so my friends, I believe Danny when he says
how important this is. Go ahead. By the way.
That every letter, and I have tons of letters
in here that are concrete examples of what you
can and should do if you want to and how you
can refashion them to suit your facts. And every
example is absolutely real. I've made up nothing.
I've disguised the names to protect the guilty,
but every single example is true because you
cannot make this stuff up. It happened to me
most of the time, and it can happen to you. I
wish you the best on your TV show opportunity,
Danny. There's a lot of opportunities with that
personality. You got the face for it. You got
the voice for it. You got the ability to both
be kind and be controversial. So I can see that.
definitely being something the network would
be my friends those of you who are visionaries
visionproslive .com top corner be our guest come
be our guest you don't have to be one of the
world's best lawyers to be on the show you can
also be starting your vision out as well and
we'll see you guys on the next episode of vision
pros live thank you for being here today i'm
really happy that you tuned in to vision pros
live i'm looking forward to seeing your reactions
as these episodes continue to move forward this
is going to get more and more fun we'll have
more and more engagement as well we'll invite
people to participate in the show and thank you
for giving us your time and attention. Have an
excellent time building out.