The shutdowns actually do little harm but Obama knows how to use them to inflict pain or at least inconvenience on the public (like shutting down the WWII monument) and the media will give those incidents a lot of publicity while making sure the public thinks it's all the Republicans' fault.
I don't think Obama is smart enough to make most decisions on his own. I think he's an empty suit who has everything prepared for him by his hardcore leftist handlers, thus the constant need for teleprompters, and also the reason for many of his golf outings and vacations: while his commie handlers are figuring out his next moves and what he should say to the country, they tell him to 'get lost' for awhile.
“He doesn’t have to make deals because he can always shut down the government if they don’t cave, knowing that the media will blame the Republicans for the shutdown and the public will be fooled into thinking that is the case.”
The Republicans can easily eliminate the shutdown threat. Instead of sending one giant budget bill to the president, they can send hundreds or thousands of individual appropriations bills funding each agency or even each program. The president can then choose which to sign and which to veto. No government shutdown unless he vetoes all of them. In that case, even the most stupid voter would have to recognize it is the president shutting down the government. It is the single giant “all or nothing” spending bill, sent to the president at the last minute, that gives the president his power.
Why won’t the GOP fund the government in hundreds or thousands of individual spending bills? Perhaps they like the drama.