Hopelessly twisted in a deadlock and faced with taking the blame for forcing the first financial default in the nation’s history, congressional negotiators blinked and created a special 12-member super-committee to do what the House and Senate could not-find $1.5 trillion worth of additional savings in the federal budget within the next six months.

Days after President Barack Obama signed the compromise deal to avert U.S. default, Capitol Hill staff and Washington lobbyists now describe the anticipated onslaught of lobbying targeting the supercommittee as something between a military invasion and the quest for the holy grail. It will be a full-court press by K Street to push their clients’ agendas and protect their interests when every line of the federal budget is up for the ax.

‘It’s like putting a big honey pot in the middle of a forest,