US govt shutdown: No progress on stalemate

The political impasse in the US Congress over budget showed no signs of easing as the first meeting between President Barack Obama and lawmakers since a budget deadlock shut wide swaths of the federal government failed to yield any result.

Obama told lawmakers that he is not going to negotiate over the need for Congress to act to reopen the government or to raise the debt limit to pay the bills Congress has already incurred, the White House said after the meeting.

Obama reinforced his view that the House should put the clean government funding bill that has been passed by the Senate up for a vote.

"The House could act today to reopen the government and stop the harm this shutdown is causing to the economy and families across the country," the White House said.

In a TV interview, Obama said he was "exasperated" by the sequence of events that led to shutdown of his government and warned the Wall Street that they should also be concerned with this development.

"I think it's fair to say that during the course of my presidency I have bent over backwards to work with the Republican Party and have purposely kept my rhetoric down.

I think I'm pretty well known for being a calm guy. Sometimes people think I'm too calm. And am I exasperated? Absolutely I'm exasperated, because this is entirely unnecessary," Obama told the CBS news in an interview.

Obama warned that investors should be worried.

"This time's different. I think they should be concerned," Obama said.

"When you have a situation in which a faction is willing potentially to default on US government obligations, then we are in trouble," he said.

House of Representative Speaker John Boehner told reporters that Obama during the meeting reiterated one more time that he will not negotiate.

"We sent four different proposals over to our Democrat colleagues in the Senate. They rejected all of them. We've asked to go to conference, to sit down and try to resolve our differences. They don't want to -- they will not negotiate," he told reporters inside the White House after the meeting with Obama.

The US government closed non-essential operations on Tuesday after Congress failed to strike a deal on spending and budget due to differences over 'Obamacare', the signature healthcare programme of President Obama.

Republicans and Democrats are blaming each other for the impasse.

The shutdown has left nearly 800,000 employees on unpaid leave and closed national parks, tourist sites, government websites, office buildings, and more.

"All we want you to do is open the government," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told reporters, blaming the Republicans in the House of Representatives for this unprecedented event in nearly 18 years.

"All we have to do is bring it up, pass it in the House.

It comes to the president's desk. Government is open. Then we go to the table, as the leader suggests, on the budget, and some of that discussion can be helpful in terms of addressing growth, deficit reduction and how we go forward on the debt ceiling," Nancy Pelosi, the House Democratic Leader said.

Reid supported Obama's decision not to budge under pressure from the Republicans.

"It just has never happened before where a political party would be willing to take the country to the brink of financial disaster and say we're not going to allow us to pay our bills," Reid said.

"For the good of the order and the confidence of the American people, we should take the debt ceiling debate off the table. The United States of America will always honor the full faith and credit of our country. And no president should be held hostage to that for a social or other agenda," Pelosi said in a joint media appearance with Reid.

Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters that Obama is attaching zero demands to the general proposition that Congress should simply open the government, keep it open.

"He's asking for nothing, he is making no demands, he is attaching no partisan strings to his request that Congress fulfill its responsibility to ensure that the United States does not default on its obligations for the first time in our long history," he argued.

Meanwhile, the State Department said as a result of the government shutdown its ability to provide military assistance to Israel and other allies in the timeframe that is expected and customary could be hindered depending on the length of the shutdown.

"So while there are no furloughs, it's not just business as usual, and there are programs, certainly, that are affected and which all could be up and running again if Congress could get some business done," the State Department spokesperson, Marie Harf, told reporters at her daily news conference.

The US government will run out of cash on October 17 unless its debt ceiling is raised.