The Buzz August 16th 2025: Trump and Putin meet in Alaska

The Buzz August 16th 2025: Trump and Putin meet in Alaska

Welcome to the weekend and welcome to The Buzz.

Let’s start with yesterday’s diplomatic movie of the week. Real-life dictator Vladimir Putin met with wannabe dictator Donald Trump. In Alaska, of all places. Alaska, where Russia sold the U.S. the territory in 1867 (yes, 1867, ring a bell?) for not more than a bag of hockey pucks (2 cents an acre to be exact).

Lots of pretty pictures, lots of all news chatter, but did anything really happen to bring peace to Ukraine? After a three-hour meeting and short statements telling each other how great each was, the key phrase seemed to be “starting point”. Whether this could lead to a story in Ukraine is still very much somewhere in the distance.

Neither leader left reporters and analysts with much to chew on. The BBC’s chief North American correspondent, Gary O’Donoghue, managed to come up with this:

Warm words but no breakthrough in Alaska

We can all hope this leads to something real on the peace front, but as usual, whether that’s the case will depend on what’s in the fine print.

Meanwhile, you can always rely on veteran newsman Dan Rather to have something to say about an event like this, and he sure did, just before it all started, on his Substack:

Coming to America

Moving on...

If you are a federal government employee these days, then you are probably wondering and worrying about your future.

There’s an assumption that by the time the much-awaited first Carney budget comes down this fall, there will be cuts in the public service. How many, how deep and just where the knife will fall is at this point anyone’s guess.

There are hundreds of thousands of federal government jobs, 357,000 at last count, and that was two years ago. That number was about 100,000 more than the day Justin Trudeau became prime minister in 2015. Over the years, numbers rose up and down, but only slightly from the Mulroney era through to Stephen Harper’s. Trudeau didn’t hold back, and Carney is making it clear he won’t hold back either, but in the other direction. Whether that means cuts, attrition, or both is still unclear.

At this point, he has public support to cut. The research company Leger concluded that in their latest survey:

More than half of Canadians want cuts to the federal public service: poll

It’s clear there is a lot of heavy-duty thinking going on about just how to deal with the public service, its employees, and its leadership.

Kathryn May spends a lot of her time thinking about the future of the public service, and she wrote this for Policy Options:

Carney’s 15-per-cent challenge: Cutting and rewiring Canada’s public service

There are a lot of things I don’t know, but here is one thing for sure about the public service I didn’t know. I wonder if you did. Members of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) are not considered public service employees. There are almost, in total, about 100,000 members of CAF. The reasoning is complicated, but basically it comes down to a distinct legal status which is not held by regular public service employees.

The issue of how deep cuts should go will almost certainly be an issue in Parliament when it returns this fall.

Certainly if, as expected, Pierre Poilievre returns to the House of Commons after this coming Monday’s byelection in Alberta. He’ll be trying to rid the loser image he’s had since the April election, and cutting costs is one of his pet promises.

For the latest on the byelection, we turn to the Calgary Herald’s Stephen Tipper:

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says he's campaigning in Battle River-Crowfoot like he's 'one vote behind'

Canadians who voted for Mark Carney because they liked his stance on climate change must be wondering about their decision.

Carney had talked about climate change for years before entering politics, and even had a United Nations job dealing with it. But these days, some Canadians are worried he’s moved away from his earlier positions. Gillian Stewart is a Calgary-based writer who put this together for the Toronto Star:

🔒 Opinion: Mark Carney seems to have given up on his climate change agenda

For years now, Canada has made its name on the security front by hosting the Halifax Security Conference.

Security experts and leaders from around the world come to discuss and debate global issues. The late U.S. Senator and former Republican presidential candidate John McCain was a regular attendee and a huge promoter of Halifax. Maybe that’s why grudge-hoarding Donald Trump is not a fan and why the U.S. says it will no longer attend. Steven Chase of The Globe and Mail had his take on this:

🔒 Pentagon skipping Canadian security forum makes U.S. look weak, summit president says

Guess who loves the ‘Canada is peeved at the U.S.’ story? The NY Times.

The paper seems to have something in its pages every week about our “rage” as some see it. This week, it’s a really good piece from Toronto podcaster and author Stephen Marche:

🔒 ‘Profound and Abiding Rage’: Canada’s Answer to America’s Abandonment

It’s been a long, hot, and muggy summer, at least in these parts of Central Canada. So hot and so muggy that water levels must be down.

They’re certainly down where I live in Stratford, Ontario. And for a city that thrives in the summer on the business of looking extremely pretty, low water levels are far from a good thing. Cue Sophia Coppolino:

Stratford’s iconic Avon River has dried up, stunning locals and tourists

Such are the hardships of living in beautiful Stratford. I walk past the Avon every morning on my early exercise. It’s a shame, but hopefully this too will pass.

That’s The Buzz for this week, we will return in seven days when I’ll be in Cape Breton!

The Buzz is a weekly publication from National Newswatch that shares insights and commentary on the week’s developments in politics, news and current affairs.