DURING THE 1992 presidential campaign, William Safire, the crusty conservative columnist for the New York Times, started writing about the concerns he had with the pervasive climate of secrecy in the White House, the notion that the president, whose name was Bush, didn't seem to understand that in the United States, phrases like "national security" don't always trump the right of the people to know what the government is doing.

In the end – on the basis of that problem alone – the lifelong Republican and former speechwriter for Richard Nixon announced he was voting for Bill Clinton.

I thought about that when I heard the year-end press conference of another president named Bush on the radio Monday morning. It was hard to believe I was hearing right, so I checked the CNN transcript when I got into the office. Here's what George W. Bush said when a reporter asked him about the disclosure that he had authorized domestic wiretaps without any sort of warrant:

"The fact that we're discussing this program is helping the enemy."

The implication: The public should never have found out illegal wiretaps were being used. The press should never have asked about it. Nobody should know because, after all, that will help Osama bin Laden and the terrorists.

Bush is on the ropes. His poll numbers are plummeting, and the Democrats are talking almost seriously about taking back Congress in the midterm elections. He scrambled to defend his policies in Iraq and his clandestine spying on Americans in a prime-time speech and a press conference – and by all accounts, it's not working. Even the conservatives (the real conservatives) don't like this government-secrecy and phone-tapping stuff.

Now the Democrats need to get off the defensive, go on the offensive, and present a real alternative, a set of public policies that would give people a reason to vote for them and not just against Bush. But I'm not seeing a lot of that going on. In fact, as we point out on page 11, the Democratic House leader, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, has handed Republicans the ability to start privatizing national parks. Her Presidio Trust bill (backed by a bunch of progressive foundations and nonprofits that should have been looking for ways to challenge the right-wing agenda) lays the philosophical groundwork for a new attack on public land.

Which isn't terribly good offense or defense.

Tim Redmond

tredmond@sfbg.com