Now going on day four, the U.S. government does not appear to have made much progress in coming to a resolution that would put it back in effect.

The House Republicans are keeping their hard line against President Obama’s health care program, while Obama himself refuses to back down from his insistence on the issue.

“The House Republicans will be the losers in this fight,” said political science professor Cal Jillson.

However, Jillson said despite that assertion, their “high pain threshold” makes it “difficult to say how long [the shutdown] will last” and poses challenges that could only escalate the current side effects to ones of a far worse magnitude.

“If it lasts a couple of weeks and blends into the debt ceiling debate in mid-October, the dangers of real damage to the economy
rise exponentially.”

The U.S. economy takes a hit with each day the stalemate continues. Jillson’s colleague and Director of SMU’s Tower Center James Hollifield called the “economic consequences” of a U.S. default on debts “too terrible to contemplate.”

“I assume that the Congress and the president will do everything possible to avoid that outcome,” Hollifield said.

At the heart of SMU’s own community, the Bush Presidential Library and Museum remain closed, as both are federally-funded. The Center did announce that all advance ticket buyers for public tours would be refunded their full ticket price within 10 business days of the government re-opening.