Despite being booted from his opening gig at the Army concert for his inflammatory and eliminationist rhetoric toward President Obama, Ted Nugent is unapologetic and claims to have the support of the Romney campaign for his particular flavor of free speech.

Via John Aravosis at AmericaBlog, Nugent's claim of encouragement by the Romney campaign:

Ted Nugent, after a Secret Service investigation, a canceled Army concert and an outpouring of criticism, said presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney's camp "expressed support" for the controversial comments he made about President Obama last month at the annual National Rifle Association meeting. The no-holds-barred Texas rocker told CBS' "This Morning" that Romney's campaign told him to "stay on course" and not to tone it down after Nugent said he will "either be dead or in jail by this time next year" if President Obama is re-elected. "I got the sensation it was, not from Mitt himself or Mrs. Romney, stay on course Ted, freedom of speech is a beautiful thing," Nugent said in the interview, which aired Friday morning.

Now if this were false, one might expect the Romney camp to firmly deny they said such a thing. But they didn't deny it, choosing instead to release the same non-statement they released when Nugent first spewed his nonsense at the NRA convention:

"Divisive language is offensive no matter what side of the political aisle it comes from," Romney's spokeswoman Andrea Saul said in the statement. "Mitt Romney believes everyone needs to be civil."

So if Ted Nugent says it civilly, then it's totally all right with Romney? This is the problem with Mitt Romney and it will continue to be the problem with Mitt Romney. He is so afraid to actually take a stand on anything from his gay foreign policy adviser to a rogue supporter who now believes he has a blessing from the Romney camp to spew even more unpleasantries into the news cycle that he cowers behind a milquetoasty kind of "ewwww, divisive language" statement.

I have a confession to make. There was a time in the not-too-distant past where I believed civil conversations could be had between liberals and conservatives. The past three years have cured me of that misperception. Even Barack Obama, with his love of bipartisanship and civility stood firm on the issue of race and actually bothered to deliver a speech that called out those who were using his race (and his pastor) to score political points.

Yet Mitt Romney just continues his meander down the pathways of non-committal pandering in the hopes that it will get him elected. I would suggest that if he were elected, he would reveal himself to be the guy who thinks Ted Nugent's remarks were just fine. In fact, I could see him clapping Nugent on the back and telling him to keep up the good work. He just won't do it now. He's running for office, after all!