I knew that the pro-government health care protesters could be quite thuggish, but I never thought they would actually go this far:

A 65-year-old man had his finger bitten off Wednesday evening at a health care rally in Thousand Oaks (CA), according to the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department.

Sheriff’s investigators were called to Hillcrest and Lynn Road at 7:26 p.m.

About 100 protesters sponsored by MoveOn.org were having a rally supporting health care reform. A group of anti-health care reform protesters formed across the street.

A witness from the scene says a man was walking through the anti-reform group to get to the pro-reform side when he got into an altercation with the 65-year-old, who opposes health care reform

If you can’t beat ‘em, chomp ‘em. Was this the new sales pitch for ObamaCare the administration was talking about?

Update: Mary Katharine Ham has the other side (and the rest of) the story…