American politics in 2008 are defined by an ancient dichotomy, says the Rev. Goonie — fear and hope. At the tail end of a three hour bar binge at SeaTac Airport, a short day away from performing a marriage ceremony in Phoenix, as he puts his seat in a locked and upright position, the good reverend sums up this year’s political climate as clearly as Anderson Cooper on Jesus Juice.

“We are at the greatest American crossroads in 300 years,” he says. “This is the swan song of possibility. We all have to decide: do we vote based on fear, or do we vote on hope?”

Reverend Goonie is a DJ, a musician, a brilliant writer, and he has the most beautiful picture of his Siddhartha-like smiling face spray painted on a wall in Montreal. He is one of several people chosen to speak on the significance of what many consider a tipping point for politics in America. You know what the pundits say. These are perspectives you won’t get on CNN, or even Disinfo.net.

Fasten your seatbelts.

“I don’t know if I understand politics,” says Daniel Blue, Tacoma persona mucho grata, freelance genius, poet, musician and relatively young wise man. “I see politics on a small and personal level.”

Like the framers of American democracy, Blue sees politics as a tool of the people. National movements don’t interest him as much as power he can see being exercised. A member of a swelling group of DIY community builders, Blue wants to see what he — and the rest of us — can do right here at home. That’s where he finds hope.

Blue considers the task of building relationships between people, forgiveness of difference and the perpetual struggle to maintain personal connections every bit as daunting and noble as any megalithic political machination.

“I tend to move where I see results,” he says, adding, “I want to put my energy into good things.”

Mark Womack wants to see what the people can do as well. Womack also goes by General Wojack, front man for Tacoma hip-hop heavies Criminal Nation, a politically-conscious hip-hop crew that made its name during the 1980s and 90s. As a former gang leader turned rap artist, community activist and father, Wojack uses a word popularized by Public Enemy’s Chuck D to describe his feelings toward the current state of politics.

“Politricks,” he says. “I see all sorts of lies. I believe in Barack Obama and the presidency, but think people might be fooled about what happens behinds the presidency.  We’re all caught up on the surface if it.”

Wojack says it would be a mistake to entrust all the changes that need to be made to one leader, or to political process in general.

“All of this is going on before our very eyes,” he says. “All of us together need to make the change. We don’t need a leader, but they convince us that (we) do. I want to see the world change, but I want to see what we can do.”

John Mason, whose name has been changed at his request, remembers a time when America faced a similar crossroads. An African-American Born in 1922, Mason was 8 years old when his father came home and said, “The bank’s closed.” That day marked the beginning of the Great Depression. Three years later, the country was in shambles, and Republican incumbent Herbert Hoover lost by a wide margin to New Deal architect Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who promised to rebuild America. Mason’s family, having voted Republican since Lincoln, “switched sides” as Mason puts it, voting for FDR.

“They voted for Roosevelt because he gave people hope,” says Mason.