U.S. lawmakers hurtled toward a midnight deadline to avert hundreds of billions of dollars in tax increases and spending cuts, struggling to extract the country from a fiscal trap they created.

Even if they reach a last-minute budget agreement, it would be short of the so-called grand bargain of deficit reduction lawmakers envisioned.

Instead, a deal would be the least common denominator, blunting only some of the recession-causing policies Congress imposed as unthinkable consequences to force compromise. Further, any deal reached just before or after tonight's deadline would set another deadline in early 2013 when lawmakers will again fight over the debt ceiling.

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