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

A new highly-political movie was released Friday depicting three male childhood friends touring Europe — who stepped up to the plate and saved a train load of people from certain slaughter by stopping a radical Islamic terrorist attack in Paris in August 2015.

This is not your run-of-mill establishment Hollywood movie featuring fake heroes – far from it. The three brave men that actually saved that train of innocents were cast to play themselves in ’15:17 to Paris’ directed by Hollywood icon 87-year-old Clint Eastwood of ‘Dirty Harry’ fame whose most memorable lines are “Make my day” and “Get off my front yard.” The screenplay was adapted from a book written by the three friends that caught the famous director’s attention.

Eastwood could have picked an all-star cast like Brad Pitt, Johnny Depp and Will Smith, but he didn’t. These three long-time friends — when they were together on that day — formed a fourth personality and it was this persona that took down the sole attacker armed with a knife and an AK-47 auto-fire rifle with 300 rounds of ammunition while the train barreled down the tracks at nearly 200 miles per hour. Two of the men had military training, one did not. The three friends acting as one disarmed the gunman, beat him into submission and hog-tied him until French police took over the scene.

Obviously Eastwood could see this dimension involving these three old friends – Alek Skarlatos, Spencer Stone and Anthony Sadler from Sacramento, California.

“There was something about the camaraderie of these three guys growing up together,” Eastwood said on ABC News’ “Nightline. “I said ‘I wonder if these guys could do it?’” Well … they did it. Eastwood and his new real-hero stars are being critically acclaimed.

Skarlatos, Stone and Sadler were awarded the Legion of Honor Award for bravery – France’s highest decoration plus all three met with President Obama and they received other awards for heroism.

A strong supporter of President Donald Trump, Eastwood does not follow liberal Hollywood in the least. His recent movies have all been about American-bred hometown heroes. He endures much criticism and some liberal actors refuse working with him. Everything Eastwood does these days is political.

‘15:17 to Paris’ comes on the heels of another Eastwood movie the controversial ‘American Sniper’ telling the real-life story of U.S. Navy Seal sharp-shooter the late Chris Kyle with the most enemy kills ever recorded by a Navy Seal. ‘American Sniper’ came on the heels of “Sully” also directed by Eastwood depicting another real-hero story about pilot Chesley B. Sullenberger who after just taking off from a New York City airport suffered an engine-killing bird strike and successfully lands the airliner on the Hudson River saving all 155 lives. This was a story that gripped the nation as it played out in ‘Breaking News’ broadcast around the world.

So what’s so political about making movies about real-life heroes? In the cases of the three friends, Kyle and Sullenberger absolutely nothing is wrong with recognizing and glamorizing their heroic deeds. They are all role models to be admired, respected and loved.

But every day the unsung heroes get little to no recognition. You know who they are – all law enforcement officers, all firefighters, all emergency-medical personnel and all U.S. military personnel. All of these groups are fighting wars across the oceans and across the nation. Guns, drugs, crime, terror, violence everywhere — is what these people face daily all to protect us. So what should we do as a nation to honor them all in such a way and to such a scale that would raise the bar for appreciation of the unsung.

Late Friday night and early Saturday morning two more LEOs were shot to death in the line of duty in Westerville, OH. Fatal attacks upon police across the USA happen just about every three days somewhere in the USA. These uniformed men and women are the backbone of any community. What would we do without them in this age of guns, drugs, crime, terror and violence?

Last week President Trump suggested having a large-scale military parade on the streets of Washington causing waves of controversy. The last big military parade was held June 1991 in New York City witnessed by an estimated 5-million people watching some 28,000 soldiers in full military dress having just returned from Iraq and Operation Desert Storm, according to news reports from that time.

The president’s forever critics in the U.S. Congress immediately started drafting bills to block any funding for a patriotic parade to honor the strongest military force known to man. Mainstream media scoffs at the idea of a ‘Trump Parade’ and of course the late-night not-so-funny comedians are having a field day making fun of it.

The parade critics seem to forget Senate Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is on record requesting a military parade in 2014 for President Obama to preside over. That parade never happened.

It’s easy to see why President Trump wants to have the biggest, the longest and the loudest salute to the military ever held anywhere. He’s that way in case you haven’t noticed.

It’s risky holding a military parade in Washington in the current anti-Trump environment. The well-intended parade could easily turn into an anti-Trump protest complete with pink vagina hats, LGBTI, DACA Dreamers, Antifa jerks, ‘#MeToo’ girls, Black Lives Matter nonsense, clueless snowflakes and misinformed wackos holding signs that would try to disrupt the parade right there in front of Trump’s reviewing stand. Get the tear gas and armored SWAT with the high-pressure water hoses ready.

No final decision on the parade has been reached, but what if the military, firefighters, police, EMS and their supporters like ‘Bikers for Trump’ from across the nation all came together for a festive July 4th parade honoring the United States of America, the National Anthem and the Flag and just let the liberals try to disrupt it. There they’d be on national TV again as anti-American. That wouldn’t be the kind of public relations the Democrats need come this November’s election. So go ahead — “Make my day.”

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.