White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel apologized to the Special Olympics after tactlessly calling a group of liberals who planned to run attack ads against the Obama administration “f—ing retarded.” Emanuel joined 54,000 Americans in an effort to stop the use of the “r-word.” This obvious PR move on Emanuel’s behalf has raised an interesting question: Has America become too politically correct?

Upon hearing the vulgar remark, Sarah Palin criticized Emanuel for his poor word choice. The mother of a child with Down’s syndrome, Palin compared the word “retarded” to the “n-word” and demanded that Emanuel should be removed from his position for one insensitive remark. Don Imus flashback, anyone?

As tasteless and inconsiderate as Emanuel’s remark were, according to the First Amendment, every American, including Emanuel, has the right to freedom of speech. However, it seems as though America has started to censor itself, almost to the point of extremity. Forty years ago, Americans would greet each other with “Merry Christmas” wishes and school halls would be decorated with Christmas trees and Santa Clauses without political backlash. Fast forward decades later, in a more diverse nation, some American schools forbid those Christmas trees and Santa Clauses, and many feel obligated to say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” for fear of being seen as insensitive or worse, anti-Semitic.

If Emanuel were to be fired, America would be contradicting the First Amendment and, in some ways, censoring Emanuel. In supposedly the freest nation in the world, the American voice is being drowned out by a wave of political correctness. Like the Red Scare of the ‘40s and ‘50s, Americans are becoming increasingly more afraid of expressing their thoughts, so as not to offend anyone or be “blacklisted.” Say you are against affirmative action, and you are automatically deemed a racist. Say you do not support Americans invading Iraq, you are assumed to be “unpatriotic” or “against of the troops.”

What makes political correctness more damaging, besides scaring controversial or unconventional ideas or ways of thinking out the door, is that political correctness is not equally distributed amongst the American population. For instance, why is it socially acceptable for a black American to say the “n-word,” but all hell breaks loose when a white person uses the “n-word” in the same context? Isn’t the word offensive either way? Why censor one and not the other?

When will the madness end? When will Americans be allowed to say what they want to say, where they want, and how they want to say it, without having to walk on egg shells? I’m not saying that Americans shouldn’t exercise some restraint or sensitivity; we should. But at the end of the day, this is America, land of the free, home of the brave. Here, you are free to express your opinion… but no one has to listen it.