CR Note: Regardless of where these paltry amounts end up, by the time this particular episode concludes, it will best be described as "group Budgetary masturbation" for its stunningly negligible results.....

Foxnews

WASHINGTON -- "Riders" -- policy decisions that make up part of a budget -- are still dividing the two sides but the numbers are closer to gelling in a deal to prevent a looming government shutdown, according to the House No. 2 Democrat.

House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer told NBC's "Today" show on Friday that lawmakers trying to avert a government shutdown have come "70 percent of the way on the numbers" in budget talks, but are still fighting over social policies such as abortion and the environment.

"There's no deal yet, unfortunately," Hoyer said in the morning before a midnight deadline to reach a deal or see government services close up.

Hoyer said, "We're pretty close," but more work is needed. But a GOP aide close to the negotiations told Fox News overnight that talks ended around 3 am at an impasse -- largely over the size of the cuts and their composition.

The aide added that while nothing is agreed until everything is agreed, there has been some narrowing on the riders but not much movement on the cuts. Democrats wouldn't consider or work off of anything above their level of cuts, which is a problem, the aide said, adding that at this point, the Senate may want to take up the one-week operations bill passed by a divided House on Thursday. That would fund the Pentagon for the duration and cut $12 billion in domestic spending.

"We were not very far apart. The bigger issues seemed to be ideological. I think the speaker needed the drama for his internal purposes," said one senior Democratic aide.

While negotiators worked through the night, President Obama said he was expecting an answer in the morning on avoiding a shutdown. 

"My hope is, is that I'll be able to announce to the American people sometime relatively early in the day that a shutdown has been averted, that a deal has been completed that has very meaningful cuts in a wide variety of categories, that helps us move in the direction of living within our means, but preserves our investments in things like education and innovation, research, that are going to be important for our long-term competitiveness," Obama told reporters Thursday evening in an appearance at the White House briefing room.

"That's what I hope to be able to announce tomorrow. There's no certainty yet, but I expect an answer sometime early in the day," he said.

Hoyer called it "inappropriate" for Congress to be raising the specter of an interruption of government services to the public because of its inability to settle partisan differences over federal spending policy.

He said that Democrats compromised "when we were in charge of the House and had disagreements with George Bush." He added that he's "embarrassed" about putting the country on the brink of a shutdown. 

"You can't negotiate on the basis that one side gives 100 percent and the other side gives zero," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.