The qualifier 'conservative' borders on pleonasm: there is is scarcely any talk radio in the U.S. worth talking about that is not conservative.  This is part of the reason the Left hates the conservative variety so much.  They hate it because of its content, and they hate it because they are incapable of competing with it: their own attempts such as Air America have failed miserably. And so, projecting their own hatred, they label conservative talk 'hate radio.'

In a 22 March op-ed piece in the NYT, Bob Herbert, commenting on the G.O.P., writes, "This is the party that genuflects at the altar of right-wing talk radio, with its insane, nauseating, nonstop commitment to hatred and bigotry."

I find that vile outburst fascinating.  There is no insanity, hatred, or bigotry in any of the conservative talk jocks whom I listen to:  Laura Ingram, Bill Bennett, Hugh Hewitt, Mike Gallagher, Dennis Prager or Michael Medved.  There is instead common sense, humanity, excellent advice, warnings against extremism, deep life wisdom, facts, arguments, and a reasonably high level of discourse.  Of the six I have mentioned, Prager and Medved are the best, a fact reflected in their large audiences.  See for yourself!

So what is it about Herbert and people  of his ilk that causes them to react routinely in such delusional fashion?

It is a long story, of course, but part of it is  that lefties confuse dissent with hate.  They don't seem to realize that if I dissent from your view, it doesn't follow that I hate you.  This confusion goes hand in hand with the strange notion that the Left owns dissent, which I duly refute in a substantial post.

I leave you with a quotation from David Horowitz, Left Illusions: An Intellectual Odyssey (Spence, 2003), p. 273, emphasis added:

The image of the right that the left has concocted — authoritarian, reactionary, bigoted, mean-spirited — is an absurd caricature that has no relation to modern conservatism or to the reality of the people I have come to know in my decade-long movement along the political spectrum — or to the way I see myself. Except for a lunatic fringe, American conservatism is not about "blood and soil" nostalgia or conspiracy paranoia, which figure so largely in imaginations that call themselves "liberal," but are anything but. Modern American conservatism is a reform movement that seeks to reinvent free markets and limited government and to restore somewhat traditional values. Philosophically, conservatism is more accurately seen as a species of liberalism itself — and would be more often described in this way were it not for the hegemony the left exerts in the political culture and its appropriation of the term "liberal" to obscure its radical agenda.

One more thing.  You can see from Herbert's picture that he is black. So now I will be called a racist for exposing his outburst.  That is right out of the Left's playbook:  if a conservative disagrees with you on any issue, or proffers any sort of criticism, then you heap abuse on him.  He's a racist, a sexist, a xenophobe, a 'homophobe,' a bigot, a religious zealot . . . .