General Debate 02 August 2026

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Cassandra

Josh Shapiro is the Governor of Pennsylvania and a Democratic possibility for the 2028 presidential election. Among his qualifications (and he is an attractive candidate) is his role in signing LeBron James for the Philadelphia basketball team! Sometimes the USA is a less than serious country. But I suppose our fascination with sporting heroes is pretty extreme too. It hasn’t led to Parliament though.
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August 2, 2026 8:02am
- CJames
  
  He will never be a Democrat nominee for President as he is Jewish.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:18am
- mike
  
  Well, they do have a reality TV show personality as president {twice}.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:39am
  - CJames
    
    As opposed to those who have been professional politicians all their lives?
    Trump was actually a property developer before he went to TV, and why he was there, but for many people that was probably worse.
    
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    August 2, 2026 8:43am
    - mike
      
      You forgot his casino record – three bankruptcies.
      
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      August 2, 2026 8:50am
      - AitchW
        
        And that is why you lefties despise him.
        He takes enormous risks, some of which fail, some of which succeed.
        Who dares, wins.
        Meanwhile lefties aspire simply to spend OPM.
        
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        August 2, 2026 9:00am
      - Nukuleka
        
        Have you ever had the guts- and been prepared to take the consequent risk- of starting up a business, mike, or have you always sucked from the public teat? I’d be interested. I have never started a business myself though I have worked as an independent contractor. I very much admire those who take risks in life and who are prepared to face the ups and downs associated, including potential banckruptcy. What an amazing life story to have picked oneself up from banckruptcy and become President of the USA. Highly admirable, isn’t it?
        
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        August 2, 2026 9:02am
artemisia

Has the arts sector ever done it this hard? The Spinoff today.

We asked arts industry representatives what funding cuts and political indifference is doing to the arts. The answer? ‘This is really fucked.’ …. Across multiple interviews, industry representatives for theatre companies, dance studios, writers festivals and more expressed dismay about the impact of the latest funding decisions. ….” Creatives should just be able to do the job that they’re really good at … There’s this critical mass at the moment of people going, ‘This is really fucked’.”

Funding decisions, taxpayer money falls from the sky?

Meanwhile – company liquidations are expected to reach their highest level since 2010 – hospo, construction, retail, food.

Funding decisions – their own money?
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August 2, 2026 8:05am
- Southern Raider
  
  It’s akin to having a hobby that not many people value but demanding that taxpayers fund you to do it.
  
  Arts are important for society but the vast majority don’t actually generate any real value and are just another form of beneficiary.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:11am
  - Swifty
    
    A lot of the ‘art’ produced in NZ is absolute crap – and the more public money thrown at it the more crap will be produced and by people who really should admit they just haven’t got it and go and do something else.
    
    How do I know it’s crap? For the very reason that the ‘artists’ concerned require public subsidisation. People clearly don’t value their work enough, or at all, to voluntarily part with their cash for it.
    
    It’s a sign.
    
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    August 2, 2026 9:00am
    - David Garrett
      
      Swifty: I don’t disagree…but perhaps it is significant that a good number of now famous artists never sold a painting during their lifetimes
      
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      August 2, 2026 9:17am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Oh dear, why don’t most people want to spend their own hard-earned money on going to the theatre or to a dance performance?
  
  Are most of us philistines?
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:19am
  - rouppe
    
    I never went to opera, I can’t see the point in going to something I can’t understand.
    
    But I used to go to theatre, a bit. Mainly during Arts Festival weeks. The ones I remember were funny, or clever, or interesting, or a combination.
    
    But towards the turn of the century, they stopped being those things. They started trying to push an agenda rather than being entertaining. Comedians thought they were funny if the used the word “f***” a lot. Then Trump came into the political scene and the height of comedy became saying “f*** Trump” a lot. Theatre became largely about Maori or women or LGB.
    
    That’s why I stopped going. They just stopped being funny, or clever, or interesting.
    
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    August 2, 2026 8:31am
    - Swifty
      
      It’s all over the western world.
      
      It’s all become highly politicised and all in one direction.
      
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      August 2, 2026 8:43am
    - AitchW
      
      We went to see Alan Davies on Friday. His warm up act was Jack Ansett. Nope, I’ve never heard of him either. Typical NZ comic. Said “fuck” a lot, wasn’t funny just schoolboy cracks about incest and trolling on Facebook.
      
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      August 2, 2026 9:03am
- Hugh Jarse
  
  That’s the problem with being a taxpayer supported beneficiary in a non critical area. When your precious government sponsor has spent all the money, including on you, the incoming government and your audiences have to make some hard decisions about how to prioritise spending.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:26am
- Swifty
  
  If arts groups can’t pay their people the living wage then they shouldn’t be in business.
  
  (Well, that’s what the Left say about any other business.)
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:35am
- Swifty
  
  Imagine being so unable to attract enough paying punters for your ‘art’ that you have to require forced subsidisation by NZ families – and then have the gall to be militant about it.
  
  The entitlement is off the charts.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:52am
- Simon
  
  Mass low wage immigration is a massive burden on the taxpayer. Now some of their elderly parents are arriving.
  
  Minor funding cuts for arts are a nonsense designed to fool & trick people.
  
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  August 2, 2026 9:01am
Gravelroad

This isn’t an anti-immigration comment.
New Zealand’s current population is recorded as 5,361,300.
Of that number, 223,512 people are receiving the Jobseeker Support Benefit.
We are told that this country needs more immigrants from places in Asia and India-allegedly to undertake work which people here cannot or will not do.
How many recent immigrants are ending up on a taxpayer funded Jobseeker benefit?
And how much longer can we keep funding these.
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August 2, 2026 8:17am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Is it possible to receive social security money or state houses prior to being given citizenship?
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:26am
  - rouppe
    
    You must fulfill all of the following conditions:
    Legal Status: You must be a New Zealand citizen, hold a permanent resident visa, or possess a residence class visa.
    
    Time Lived in NZ: You must have lived continuously in New Zealand for at least 2 years at any one time since becoming a citizen or gaining your residence class visa.
    
    Current Residence: You must be ordinarily resident in New Zealand, meaning NZ is your primary home and you intend to stay here.
    
    So yes you can, but someone who came on a work visa or similar can’t get it immediately.
    
    I’m not sure if a work visa is a residence class visa
    
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    August 2, 2026 8:45am
- Simon
  
  It’s the low wage immigration that NZ can’t afford. Aside from everything else.
  
  Why bring them in? It’s because National are a broken neoliberals who follow orders.
  
  Youth unemployment rate is 16% then bring in hundred of thousands of low wage immigrants.
  
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  August 2, 2026 9:04am
Andrew Worth

Charges against canoeist Hearn for supposed vandalism of the Lincoln reflecting pool have been dropped as a result of the justice department finally acknowledging that the issues have been caused by substandard work in the refurbishment.
Trump has expressed his annoyance at the decision.
Fox, outside of print and its affiliates, has totally ignored this development.

The “vandalism” was pushed as a major headline story for weeks with such certainty.
The fact the claims of vandalism by senior representatives were baseless political smears totally ignored, with no reprocussions for those political figures from that end of the media spectrum.

New Zealand media, thank God, hasn’t gotten that bad.
I think the entire media would be at a minimum asking how and why the politicians baying for blood got it so wrong, to the extent that it got to the point at which innocent people were being incarcerated pretrial.
In reality in NZ it would never have reached such levels of insanity, but if it had, here I think there would be an across the country demand for political heads to roll.
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August 2, 2026 8:23am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  I admire your optimism as to the integrity of NZ MSM reportage, but me, I have my doubts if the government concerned was of the Leftist persuasion.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:27am
- CJames
  
  Looks like Fox has it on their website
  https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-disagrees-100-percent-us-attorney-jeanine-pirro-reflecting-pool-case
  So does other “rightwing media
  So that shoots down your theory
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:40am
  - Andrew Worth
    
    Is it only in print on their website? Is it being covered by their news bulletins? On their far more widely viewed video and network outlets?
    
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    August 2, 2026 8:48am
  - Andrew Worth
    
    That story is covering it on terms of Trump’s criticism of dropping the charges, not on the charges being dropped because they were baseless in the first place! It’s supporting Trump’s doubling down!
    
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    August 2, 2026 8:51am
    - CJames
      
      As usual Andrew, you did not even bother to check their link. It is on their news bulletins with a 1:48 clip. So it was “outside of print and its affiliates” which it was what you originally claimed. Now you are changing your claim having been caught out.
      You must be a Labour Party “fact” checker.
      
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      August 2, 2026 9:00am
- David George
  
  I wouldn’t get too smug about our record Andrew.
  Actual political motivated vandalism of public monuments, displays and facilities are rarely prosecuted in New Zealand.
  Here it depends on who’s doing the vandalism and with what motivation – that’s just as bad.
  
  BTW the problem with the Washington pool seems to be related to overzealous or incorrect chemical use (to control the summer algae blooms) reacting with the new surface.
  
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  August 2, 2026 8:51am
  - Andrew Worth
    
    “overzealous or incorrect chemical use (to control the summer algae blooms) reacting with the new surface.”
    
    That was a theory I was advancing weeks ago, but wrong according to experts on the use of these materials, like polyurea, as pool surface coatings.
    
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    August 2, 2026 8:56am
artemisia

This month, the White House released documents suggesting that potentially more than 250,000 foreign nationals are illegally registered to vote in New Jersey, California, Pennsylvania, and Nevada alone.

The New Jersey Governor is blaming a “software error” that apparently nobody noticed for years. Some states are pushing back on the data accuracy so no doubt more to come on this. Still, even if the actual numbers turn out smaller there remains that admitted ‘software error’ that nobody noticed. For years.
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August 2, 2026 8:35am
CJames

There is an interesting (for some) case going on in the UK where the Jason Ardey, the Cambridge Professor who is the poster boy of DEI is being caught out. Not only was his thesis plagiarised, it wasn’t even spellchecked. He has also been a massive fantasist, claiming running performances and an autistic early life that no-one can verify.
Of course, his defenders call it racism. Otherwise, they would have to concede they had no sceptical judgement in their progressivism.
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August 2, 2026 8:54am

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