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I have to disagree on a lot of those points, although hopefully the reasons why are at least somewhat legitimate.
As far as character development is concerned, we do have to remember that this is only the second novel in the series. In the first we saw a Haruhi who, while happy enough, was also in a state of Melancholy, thus the title. So I don't think that the situation is going into the boarders of being contrived. Haruhi was probably written to have a personality that would cause her to do this, and we just haven't had a chance to see her do so until this point. It's true that after this she does still have some of this behaviour (I'm specifically thinking of the baseball game) she does begin to tone it down and become less of a raging sociopath over time.
You say that Haruhi isn't going to change instantly just because one person objects to what she's doing. I believe that she doesn't undergo an instant change, for example she's still more than willing to force Mikuru to play dressup, but after peeving Kyon off so badly, it became clear to her that there are limits to what can be tolerated. Also, Kyon isn't just any random person to her, even at this early stage in the narrative. At this point, it might not be horribly far off to say that he's the only person whose opinions might matter to her at all.
As far as her reaction to getting hit goes, I think that the anime portrayed it a lot better than the novels did, honestly. In the novels she comes across as an indignant brat about it, while in the anime, with exactly the same lines, you can still see that her reaction is almost one of "Why would you, of all people, be the one to do this to me?" she almost looks like she's going to cry. Whether or not she recognizes the fact that her treating other people like garbage is what spurred him to attempt it is a little besides the point, all she needs to take away from it is the jarring sense of "How far did I push him for him to be willing to do that?"
The resolution is the part I can actually mostly agree with you on. Kyon's reasoning that he needs to apologize to her because he's disagreed with what she's done is rather contrived when those disagreements were completely legitimate for the most part. Sure, he's been snarking about stuff in general, and perhaps feels a little guilty about that, but he shouldn't feel bad for taking a hard line on what is and is not acceptable. I think the apology scene, or rather the brief opening to it where Haruhi was making a ponytail just when he walked in, had more potential because it showed that Haruhi was trying, even if it was a physical attempt, to maybe work herself up to an apology. I think a mutual apology would have been so much better in the long run, with Haruhi being the one to initiate it. But sadly that's not the way it went.
I hope that even if you don't find these points to be things that you can agree with that they at least made a modicum of sense. I'm not trying to change your interpretation of events, I'm rather just offering mine as a differing viewpoint.
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