Fiscal Cliff Deal Sneaks In Wall Street Gifts, NASCAR Perk

One lobbyist said he didn't worry too much about the Baucus bill because "we knew the House wasn't going to pass it." But another lobbyist, who had worked on the PuertoRico issues, said he saw Baucus' bill as an important starting point that "set the parameters" of a future fight with HouseRepublicans.

But there never was a fight. Baucus' bill sat ignored until last week, when the WhiteHouse sat down with Senate Republicans to craft a deal averting the fiscal cliff.

A RepublicanSenate aide familiar with the cliff negotiations tells me the WhiteHouse wanted permanent extensions of a whole slew of corporate tax credits. When SenateRepublicans said no, "the WhiteHouse insisted that the exact language" of the Baucus bill be included in the fiscal cliff deal. "They were absolutely insistent," another aide tells me. 

Sure enough, Title II of the fiscal cliff legislation is nearly a word-for-word replication of the Family and Business TaxCutCertaintyAct of 2012.

So, this wasn't a case of lobbyists sneaking provisions into a huge package at the last minute. That probably wouldn't have been possible, many lobbyists told me Wednesday, because the workload in the past two weeks was too large and the political stakes were too high.

One lobbyist who worked on the bill over the summer said he would never ask a member " 'Hey, can you do this for a client,' when their political lives are on the line."

"The legislators and the staff go underground when things get so intense," another Hill staffer-turned-lobbyist told me. "Nobody has time for a meeting. Nobody wants to talk about what's going on. ... The key is to plant the seed months in advance."

GE, GoldmanSachs, Diageo -- they planted their seeds over the summer. They'll enjoy the fruit in the new year.

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