Johnson adviser Roger Stone: 'Republican blood will run in the streets'

The New York Times reports today on the potential for ex-New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson to siphon off votes from the major-party candidates, and the seething frustration of Johnson supporters at GOP efforts to undermine his campaign:

The Republican efforts to impede Mr. Johnson’s candidacy have drawn charges of spying and coercion from Libertarians and countercharges from Republicans that the party had resorted to fraud while accepting secret help from Democrats. Democrats and Obama campaign officials deny any such involvement. But Mr. Johnson has been receiving critical help from Roger Stone, a longtime Republican operative once so committed to his party that he has a tattoo of President Richard M. Nixon on his back. … Mr. Stone says he has become so frustrated with the party’s attempts to shut down Mr. Johnson, whom he says he is advising at no charge, that he vowed in an e-mail last month, “Republican blood will run in the streets b4 I am done.”

Readers may recall Stone's summer cannon blast at the Romney campaign, which he called a "one-dimensional" operation that has empowered "self-important bullshit artist" John Sununu. There's a high entertainment value to this kind of drama, but in a race this close it's also worth taking seriously. As Maggie and I wrote in July, there's such intense voter disgust with the political process and distrust of the candidates on both sides, that a certain percentage of voters may cast ballots for Johnson just as a way of flipping the bird to the 2012 election.