I don't think Americans in general really hate each other much, especially on political or religious grounds.

I do think, however, that fear-based and ignorance-based hatred is being deliberately aroused and used for political and monetary gain by some of the big power brokers. Our media have become much closer to monopolistic ownership, and that ownership, by big trans-national corporations naturally side with the 'fiscally conservative' Republicans. Those powerful interests also figured out, several decades ago, that if they could convince religious conservatives (e.g., evangelicals) to side with them, the two logically unconnected blocs could together win elections. So you have major radio station corporations unwilling to air any political talk except far right wing talk; corporate sponsors basically effecting censorship of real news, especially if the "news" might be bad for their business; very wealthy televangelists preaching that greed is good; and media messages ad infinitum equating Wall Street's status with the standard of living of the masses.

Political shock jocks like Rush Limbaugh and, even moreso, Michael Savage and Glenn Beck, as well as political media darlings like Ann Coulter, Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachman, etc., spew venomous epithets ("traitor," "fascist," "terrorist," "communist," etc.) and lies ("death panels," etc.) about just about anyone who happens to be a Democrat or even moderately liberal. Sometimes it's for political gain, but often it's for ratings and publicity.

Our Constitutional guarantee of "free speech," coupled with the deregulation of our mainstream media ownership, allows what is truly "hate speech" to be broadcast more widely and readily than might be the case in some other democracies.

I do think the hate is mainly coming from the right, and not from the majority of those on the right, either. But the very vocal minority gets a disproportion of media attention, partly because they say and do things that ARE outrageous.