The federal government has now been shut down for seven days, and the two parties appear no closer to a deal to fund it. The Republican-controlled House has passed smaller measures funding various parts of government to pressure Democrats to keep saying “no.” These included restoring funding for veterans benefits, caring for children with cancer, food assistance and national parks. The House even passed a bill by a vote of 407-0 granting retroactive pay to government workers on furlough. Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) says he won’t bring up a bill to fund the entire government until Barack Obama and the Democrats agree to negotiate deficit spending. The Obama administration and Senate Democrats refuse to budge, believing that the shutdown is only going to hurt Republicans politically. The one thing both sides agree on is that it’s the other side’s fault.

Obama did say over the weekend that he’s willing to negotiate changes to ObamaCare … but only after Republicans end the shutdown with a “clean” continuing resolution and then agree to hike the debt ceiling. That’s convincing – give him everything he wants and then he’ll talk. Of course, negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon. The pigeon knocks over all the pieces, craps on the board and then struts around like it won the game.

Meanwhile, the president continued his gambit to make the shutdown as annoying and inconvenient as possible, erecting Barackades at every national park and closing down every government website – all of which takes more effort and expense than simply letting things be. Here’s but a short list of closings due to this ridiculous political stunt: The Iwo Jim Memorial is closed, veterans were removed from the Vietnam War Memorial, highway pull-offs with a view of Mount Rushmore are blocked, some of the Florida ocean is off-limits, the Grand Canyon is closed despite Arizona’s offer to keep it open with state funds and 60 families with vacation homes at Lake Mead were ordered to leave.

One angry Park Ranger confirmed that it’s all politics: “We’ve been told to make life as difficult for people as we can. It’s disgusting.” It’s also standard operating procedure for Barack Obama.