No kidding

Michael Smerconish says we all need to lighten up a little. Our fear of offending anyone is killing us. Maybe literally …

Muzzled.

It's what we've become. After being continually schooled to walk and talk and act like automatons, it's working.

Everybody is so afraid of offending that we're sacrificing our individualism and truth. And it threatens our ability to win the war on terror. Consider:

Bill Scranton's campaign manager said that in the GOP race for governor, "the rich white guy in this campaign is Lynn Swann." Nobody blinked when the guy got fired because a stupid comment that uses a racial term is assumed to be racist, even when the statement carries no racist meaning.

Meanwhile, Sen. Rick Santorum is demanding an apology from Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid because Reid said having Santorum "talk about reform is like John Gotti talking about doing something about organized crime." It's being spun as a slur against Italians, namely Santorum.

I'm not sure it's quite as bad as Smerconish would have us believe. But I've got to say the man has a point.

As they say, read the whole thing.