On the Government Shut-down

I still don't get how you close a mountain. Hasn't a government that thinks it can close a mountain -- and does -- gotten just a smidge too big for its britches? I have this image of a Terry Gilliam cartoon where some guy in a trench coat unplugs the Rockies from the horizon, sticks them in a briefcase and walks off grunting angrily. When real life has become a Terry Gilliam cartoon, something is desperately, fundamentally wrong with real life.