Mr. O'Neill also pushed the president to set aside $1 trillion of the projected surpluses to fund one of Mr. Bush's big ideas during the campaign: the privatization of Social Security. Allowing people to invest Social Security contributions into private retirement accounts would reduce the government's future retirement liabilities, but the government would need to cover obligations to existing retirees without the money coming in from existing workers.

Mr. O'Neill said that both he and Mr. Greenspan had estimated that $1 trillion over the next decade or so would be enough to finance the transition for everybody then under the age of 37.

But Mr. Bush"seemed to shrug it off,'' according to the book.