Should this have been protected on the flop?

I don't think we need to worry about protecting a hand this strong, especially in a small pot. We are only going to lose to a bigger pocket pair sucking out on us, who are incorrectly even calling one bet on the flop, or to an ace that hits its kicker, who again has only 3 outs and is calling one bet incorrectly. So we need to think about value. I think that with the bettor to our right I probably just call the flop, try to build a big pot, and get paid off on the big streets. As every one else has said you should always sit with enough $$$ so you never go all in.