Funny how the folks who protest for peace and tolerance sometimes demonstrate so little of it themselves:

Ten minutes after telling his fellow protesters to stay safe, Gil Kobrin lay huddled in the slush and mud as two anarchists repeatedly kicked him in the back.

How he got from point A to point B is simple enough. Kobrin, accompanied by a dozen members of the conservative group ProtestWarrior, crashed a rally of hundreds of anti-Bush demonstrators at Meridian Park in Washington, D.C. Holding aloft signs that read “Say no to war unless a Democrat is president” and “Not to brag, but Bush won, so shove it!” they had set off earlier on inauguration morning in search of their opposites.

The ProtestWarrior contingent didn’t have to search for very long; the party came to them.

[...]

“I expected it, but I didn’t expect to be kicked in the back,” Kobrin said later. His boyish, twentysomething face wore a wry smile and he stood upright, but conceded that he was in some pain.

[...]

Patrick McKale, 22, an anarchist from Baltimore, said he was pleased that ProtestWarrior members took a few licks. He said he saw no irony in beating people up at a peace rally. “Just because you’re anti-imperialist doesn’t mean you’re not against violence.”

[...]

“Dude, you got your ass kicked,” one of them taunted at the ProtestWarrior group. Several anarchists, their bile neutered by the police presence, resorted to creative hand signs. It brought to mind something Kobrin had said in an earlier interview: “Ideally it should be a nice, cordial, open dialogue.”

Some in the anti-Bush crowd said they resented the fact that ProtestWarrior’s “man bites dog” schtick eats up a disproportionate amount of press attention.

“They’re taking the media away from us!” exclaimed one angry protester.

The left pats themselves on the back for their bravery in dissent, but look what happens when confronted with a little dissent of their own.