REMEMBER, THE DEMOCRATS APPLAUDED WHEN THEY DIDN’T: What if George W. Bush’s Social Security reforms had passed? “More than a decade ago, President George W. Bush set out to fix what he called a broken Social Security system. In 2001, intermediate projections had shown the retirement trust fund would be exhausted in 2040. By 2005, finances had improved and the projected exhaustion date was 2043. But today, exhaustion looms closer, only two decades away in 2035.”