WASHINGTON POST: One of a national series of rallies for health-care reform took a violent turn Wednesday night when, according to authorities in Thousand Oaks, Calif., an unidentified man bit off the tip of another man’s pinky finger. The Thousand Oaks event attracted only about 100 people — a small group compared to the turnout at congressional town halls, which have drawn up to 1,500 people. But their passions were running high, and when a supporter of health-care reform wound up among a group of about 25 counter-protesters, an argument and fistfight broke out, Ventura County Sheriff’s Capt. Frank O’Hanlon told the Associated Press. Southern California’s KTLA-TV, which first reported on the fracas, wrote, “The 65-year-old was apparently aggressive and hit the other man, who then retaliated by biting off his attacker’s pinky.” The AP reported that the injured man “retrieved the finger and went to a hospital.” A hospital spokesperson told the news service that the man, who had Medicare, “lost half the finger, but doctors reattached it and he was sent home the same night.” MORE
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