Melanie Morgan

History was made this week in the battle against treason, defeatism and pacifism at any price.

Hundreds upon hundreds of proud Americans took time away from their jobs and families in the middle of a Wednesday to march in the streets and say loudly and clearly that Code Pink and the anti-military left do not speak for America.

And we beat them back in their own backyard – in the liberal stronghold of Berkeley, Calif.

Berkeley was ground zero for the anti-war marches of the '60s. In fact, it was the birthplace of the "Free Speech" movement a couple of blocks from where new history was made.

The anti-military industrial complex headed by George Soros received quite a wake-up call. On "progressive" radio station KPFA, the lefties were somber and chastened, admitting they were out-gunned, out-maneuvered and out-classed (OK, that may be a bit of a stretch), but they couldn't believe that the "war whores," as we were called, are winning in the public square. And they moaned the pro-troops groups "make foreign policy."

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It wasn't too long ago the same people to whom we chanted our patriotic slogans "USA, USA, USA" were spitting at our troops. Now, in 2007, Code Pink and their band of Marxists, communists and anti-American bigots are trying to revive the '60s – but most folks put away the tie-dyed T-shirts, got jobs, started families (sometimes not in that order) and matured into thinking individuals.

The Code Pink crowd, however, obviously never grew up. In the last few weeks, a contingent of Code Pinkos have been gathering in front of the U.S. Marine Recruiting Center in Berkeley. They vandalized the recruiting center, harassed new recruits and called our military men and women "liars," "murderers" and "traitors."

The minute they took opposition to policy and made it into a direct attack against our troops, they crossed the line. It's not fair, civil, or logical to malign Marines for where they're ordered to go, even if it happens to be in some of the darkest corners of the world, like neighborhoods dominated by Islamic rule, or the sometimes-scarier regions of liberal Berkeley.

Calling our military men and women "predators" and "traitors" may have been a fact of life in the Vietnam era, and this may be ho-hum for many in Berkeley, but for most Americans this behavior is beyond the pale. The gifted blogger, columnist and TV commentator Michelle Malkin was representative of the "silent majority," who were sickened by the disrespect shown our troops, and Malkin put out the call to take action and fight back.

I promised Michelle I'd answer the call, and passed on word over the airwaves of KSFO in San Francisco. I soon discovered that Michelle and I weren't the only ones steaming mad. While Berkeley may be ground zero for the people who despise our military, we are not going to let CodePink (the same people who sent $600,000 to the families of terrorists in Iraq who murder our troops) get away with defaming these heroes.

Organizations and inspired individuals alike began to fire off e-mails to their supporter lists, phones started ringing, radios were buzzing with plans to take back the streets from the anti-military left.

The date was set for our response: High Noon on Wednesday, Oct. 17.

Move America Forward, Code Pink and camera crews all converged on the scene before 8 a.m. Passing public employees occasionally honked for the Pepto Bismol-clad Code Pink bunch, but as crowds started to build, it was clear where the groundswell of support would be: on the side of the patriots!

By noontime, several hundred pro-troop supporters with American flags had clogged the streets of Berkeley directly in front of the Marine Recruiting Center.

The Code Pink activists were stunned. On their own turf they were being rebuked and rejected by a massive outpouring of support for the military that dwarfed the much-smaller contingent of washed up hippies and communists who were carrying their signs denouncing our troops.

Enraged by the defeat that had been handed to them, the Code Pink crowd lashed out. One man took out a knife and tried to cut down and shred a Marine flag. Then two American flags were burned and a Code Pink activist took one of the charred flags, threw it to the ground and began to stomp on it.

Today, right now, we are at the tipping point: The haters of our military don't own the streets. Don't miss that: Despite the fact that many of us have jobs, we kicked their butts at their own street protest game on behalf of American honor.

They no longer possess that guerrilla edge that's been their hallmark for decades: not in Berkeley, not in the middle of the day, and not even when Code Pink cofounder and public face Medea Benjamin flies from D.C. to personally sing protest songs at us. The streets of America have been retaken and now belong to those who love this nation.

We faced them down and as a group; we serenaded them with "God Bless America"; we held our flag high as we recited the pledge – WE all knew the words.

They didn't know what hit them (or much else, it would seem) as wave after wave of patriots continued arriving to join the crowd.

America's streets may be cleaned by those who wield hoses and drive trucks, but they must also be cleansed by those who wield flags and defend the honor and integrity of our troops. Soap scum is a necessary fact of biology, but scrub brushes are a necessary fact of housecleaning.

What is left to do now is the same as what patriots did in Berkeley this week, but on a wider scope all across the nation.

Code Pink and their tattooed sympathizers must be confronted on every street they choose to spew their verbal vomit and lashing hatred of America and those who serve it.

We'll clean up the mess. Patriotic Americans always do.