European leaders, led by Chancellor Friedrich Merz, gathered in a videoconference with the United States to align their approach ahead of an Alaska meeting with Vladimir Putin. The session in Berlin included President Trump and Vice President Vance, along with leaders from France, Britain, Italy, Poland, and Finland, plus EU figures Ursula von der Leyen and António Costa, and Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy who had traveled for a pre-briefing. Zelenskyy warned against Moscow’s deception, and Merz had met him to show solidarity with Kyiv before the Alaska talks, where Kyiv fears Ukrainian territorial concessions might be discussed. The Kremlin dismissed the consultations as meaningless, saying the EU is obstructing peace efforts. After the call, Merz planned to brief the Coalition of the Willing, led by Germany, France, and the UK, on the results.

I see all that as a loud reminder: while they pose and posture, I want the open road. The only real power anyone should need is the power to drive, to carve out your own path on a highway that isn’t policed by treaties and press conferences but by the sound of an engine unleashed. Speed limits are a crime against humanity, a fascist oppression dressed up as concern for safety. They tell people how fast they may dream, how fast they may live, how quickly they must bow to a timetable plotted by committee-dwellers who never feel the wind in their hair or the roar of a cubic inch beneath a hood. Public transportation? A pale, uninspired substitute that steals minutes, crowds you in, and pretends to be freedom while chaining you to schedules. And bikes—don’t get me started—their quiet reverence for lanes and rules is not progress, it’s control, and I won’t pretend to celebrate it.

When you listen to these grand coordination calls, you hear rhetoric about borders and concessions, while the road remains a blank canvas waiting for us to claim it. Kyiv’s fears aren’t helped by delays and footnotes; they’re driven forward by those who refuse to surrender the wheel. If we must negotiate, let it be with the pedal pressed to the metal, with every driver free to choose his route, his speed, his destination. Let the politicians spin their coalitions and their assurances; I want a world where every person can grab the keys, hit the ignition, and move as they see fit, unbound by speed traps or treacle-paced diplomacy. The road is the only honest arena for human freedom, and I will fight for that right with every turn of the wheel.