Editor’s note: The views expressed by guest columnists are not necessarily those of The Costa Rica Star, its advertisers, or its staff.

Saturday’s display of Democratic unity was nothing more than a charade as the stars came together to showcase the government shutdown, the Women’s Marches across the country and illegal immigrants in a carefully coordinated circus to discredit President Donald Trump on the anniversary of his first-year in office at the expense of hard-working American citizens from coast-to-coast and around the world.

“Democrats can’t shut down the booming Trump economy so they shut down the government instead,” said White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders.

The United States of America has come to a fork in the road in a new world of unknown, uncharted territory being guided by President Trump – who was elected to shake things up in Washington like never before and he’s doing that. Liberals everywhere from California to New York can’t stand Trump while Americans from Pennsylvania to Nevada are cheering on this president and his ‘America First’ agenda.

In November America’s voters – liberals and conservatives — will make a choice to go either left or right at this fork in the road. The current stalemate in the U.S. Congress that resulted in a partial shutdown of the U.S. Federal Government Friday at midnight will leave a bad taste with voters. This shutdown won’t last long. The last shutdown occurred in 2013 and lasted 16 days. Since 1981 there have been 12 shutdowns all involving political maneuvering and posturing from both political parties.

The impression is this latest shutdown was directly caused by the Democratic leadership in the U.S. Senate in order to protect the interests of millions of illegal immigrants including the DACA kids brought to the USA by their parents instead of the interests of American citizens, national security and the U.S. military. These political upheavals can disrupt the lives of millions of Americans who will not quickly forget the inconveniences brought upon them for dubious political stunts.

Mainstream media is all abuzz about reviewing President Trump’s first-year in office as negatively as they can with constant coverage of the government shutdown as the president’s first State-of-the-Union address is set for Jan. 30.

The Women’s Marches attracted large crowds as hundreds of thousands of women and men took to the streets complete with those pink vagina hats and “Resist-Obstruct” protest signs. Sure enough there was ‘Hanoi’ Jane Fonda spouting her special brand of hatred. The LBGTI bunch was well represented, too. Some were pro-choice-anti-Trump, others protested sexual misconduct against women while others supported the DACA kids and there were plenty of people uncertain about why they were there. Many of those interviewed on national TV didn’t make a lick-of-sense. President Trump had the guts to speak at one of the rallies in Washington while he waits out the shutdown. It would be of interest to know just how many of these protest marchers are actual registered voters with photo IDs that participate in elections.

In addition to normal attrition, dozens of current congressional lawmakers have announced they will not seek re-election on Nov. 6, 2018 and that’s good for everybody. If they can’t stand the heat then get out of the kitchen. It seems doubtful the Democrats will regain control of the U.S. House or Senate because this Democratic Party seems to have lost touch – not only with reality but with everyday working Americans who used to be their base, but no more. There is every reason to believe that the numbers of Democrats will shrink to insignificance and be replaced with conservatives and independents eager to take on the challenges of the future by working with President Trump and not against him.

It’s long overdue that Independent voters organize and create a fully-equal local, state and national third-political party in the USA with their own field of candidates with new voices, participate in all primary elections, caucuses and debates — and hold their own national convention with their nominee standing alongside the Republican and Democratic nominees. In presidential election years there would be three choices instead of two and so on down the line on the voting ballot. Forming a new Independent National Committee would change everything. Entrenched political machines would see their power diminish. Don’t say it won’t happen because there are now more registered Independent voters (40-percent) than Democrats (32-percent) and Republicans (28-percent) nationwide, according to Real Clear Politics.

The next ten months politically is a long way down to that fork in the road but Father Time always wins and that election night should be historic. Realistically mid-term elections 2018 could go either way, but it’s hard to predict despite all the media noise otherwise. Now the Democrats and liberal mainstream media sound just like they did in 2016 with all the Hillary Clinton predictions of a landslide win over Trump. They are confident of regaining one or both houses of Congress in 2018 and the White House in 2020.

“Democrats, if you’re willing to shut down the government just to pander to illegal immigrants, you’ll have hell to pay when American voters turn out in 2018 and 2020,” said political commentator Tomi Lahren on Fox News Insider from Los Angeles in her ‘Final Thoughts’ segment on Friday.

If the Democrats think they will set the voters on fire come November think again. They don’t have a positive message for America or strong leadership. Many voters are seeing their take home pay and 401K savings go up and anything or anyone that threatens this record-setting Trump-influenced economy will get voted down and out.

Conservatives and Independents are looking forward to heating up this mid-term election getting ready to deep-fry some liberals in the voting booth.

About the Author Britt Nelson relocated to Costa Rica in 2011 from Florida, where he served as news editor for the Palatka Daily News, a newspaper owned by the New York Times Regional Newspaper Group (NYT-RNG) for 20 years.

Nelson served the NYT-RNG for 18 years in Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina and Florida as a correspondent, reporter, staff writer, senior staff writer training new reporters, copy editor, page designer, editorial writer, editorial page editor and editorial board member.