WASHINGTON • Plenty of lawmakers are against tax breaks and so-called loopholes. Unless, of course, they personally helped establish them.

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, for instance, says he is open to ending tax breaks for special interests. But when it comes to a tax break he secured in 2008 for the owners of thoroughbred racehorses, he argues that the measure is essential for the protection of jobs in his home state of Kentucky.

Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., says he too wants to eliminate such breaks, except when it comes to beer. He is one of the main supporters of a proposal that would cut taxes for smaller beer makers such as the Samuel Adams Brewery in Boston.

And Rep. Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin Republican who leads the House Budget Committee, has privately assured one beer industry group that he would support a second proposed tax break for brewers, even as he has distanced himself publicly from the measure, the beer group's chief operating officer said in an interview.

The disconnect between the lawmakers' words and deeds reflects the political hurdles that Congress and the White House face as they look to cut at least $1.2 trillion from the national debt.

Talk of cutting tax breaks to raise money and reduce the debt has become a mantra in Washington, but it threatens sacred ground: Such breaks are a favorite tool among both Republicans and Democrats to reward supporters and economic interests in their home states.

The 71,000-page tax code has become loaded with dozens of obscure but economically valuable tax breaks. NASCAR racetrack operators can speed up their write-offs for improvements to their facilities; makers of toy wooden arrows pay no excise tax; and Eskimo whaling captains get a charitable deduction of up to $10,000 for hunting blubber.

Multibillion-dollar operations such as oil refineries, Hollywood productions and hedge funds have all profited. And there is little sign that the lawmakers who helped write the breaks into the tax code are willing to back away from them.

Whether any of them are scrubbed from the books may ultimately prove how serious Congress is about reducing the debt, and how adept powerful lobbies are at guarding their benefits, political analysts and tax experts say.

"These special interests are getting carve-outs from Congress, and both sides — Republicans and Democrats — are guilty of picking their favorite interests to support," said Jason Fichtner, an economist who studies tax policy at George Mason University.

Tax breaks for industries both large and small add up to an estimated $123 billion a year — money that opponents see as lost revenue in austere times.

One of the few members of Congress willing to talk about specific breaks that could be abolished is Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.

He released a 626-page report in June that included a section on what he considered to be dozens of needless tax breaks that were "little more than corporate welfare," such as vacation home deductions and special deals for the makers of fishing tackle boxes. He also ridiculed a bevy of loose guidelines that have allowed business deductions for cat food, toupees and breast implants for exotic dancers.

In contrast, President Barack Obama has focused on a handful of tax breaks that are considered symbolically powerful, including credits for oil production and an accelerated depreciation for corporate jets.

"Do we keep tax loopholes for oil companies, or do we put teachers back to work?" Obama asked in a speech in the White House Rose Garden in September.