to have real pointed ears or, yes, elf ears. it was something i thought would be fascinating. i wouldn t go so far as being a trekkie. the lord of the rings. all the sci-fi stuff. it fit my personality. reporter: steve heyworth performs the procedure. he calls himself a body modification artist. he slices the top of the cartilage and sews it back together in a point. there s a lot of people who have an inner vision of themselves and they want to express that to the world around them. i m very happy to be an artist that can provide that kind of work. reporter: many of the comments with we found on online forum were flip about the seriousness of this kind of procedure. one person wrote i want to have elf ears, too, but i m not sure in what season to do it, because in the winter, i always wear a cap beanie and i guess it would hurt. another person wrote honestly these are not super noticeable.
it affects us. reporter: both sides say a deal is within reach but they ve not yet been able to agree upon a precise figure for spending cuts, where the cuts would come from and the controversial republican policy pronouncements about abortion, national public radio and whether or not they should strip power from the environmental protection agency. jake tapper, abc news, the white house. you know this is really interesting. as i said we heard from a lot of people at wnnfans.com about how outraged they were that, perhaps, some military families would not get paid but congressional leaders would. other things that could get held up local trash collection, tax refunds, the cherry blossom parade in d.c., although parking ticket distributors perhaps, would not be working. it could be the silver lining, i suppose. looking for something? just once it starts to affect people in that way we all sort of take note of what s happening. and you can continue to do that here on abc news.
barry bonds fate is now in the hands of a federal jury. more than three years after he was indicted and 12 days of testimony, there s nothing for the baseball slugger to do now but wait. closing arguments lasted the entire day. diana alvear has the story. reporter: barry bonds made his way into a san francisco courthouse to hear the closing arguments in his case. a case now in the hands of the jury. he is charged with three counts of lying to a grand jury and one count of obstruction of justice stemming from his testimony in 2003 as part of an investigation into steroid use in professional baseball. on wednesday, bonds defense rested, so confident they did not call a single witness to the stand. in contrast, prosecutors were forced to drop one of their charges against bonds after the judge made it clear she planned to throw it out. throughout the trial, jurors heard from 25 witnesses, including bonds former girlfriend. kimberly bell told the court bonds admitted he had taken stero
picture of partisan warfare. the reason we did not shut it down is because house will come to order. gentleman will suspend. cut spending to begin getting our fiscal house in order, and to keep reporter: they even disagree on what they disagree about. democrats say they have agreement on $34.5 billion in spending cuts but republicans say there s no agreement. the government could shut down over a dispute on abortion. democrats say republicans are trying to use the funding bill to force new restrictions on abortion rights. republicans say they are just trying to restrict public funding of abortion. if the shutdown happens for troops on the front line it will be fight now, get paid later. president obama and congressional leaders will still be paid, an irony not lost on military families. it doesn t affect them. it affects us. you know? reporter: the house did pass a controversial plan to extend government funding for a week.
now a threat to shipping traffic. the debris field is massive, stretching as much as 500 miles of the pacific, a distance of new york to michigan and it s headed straight for the united states. it will move with a powerful current, called the north pacific gyre. it will carry the remnants of 200,000 destroyed buildings, towards washington, then oregon and california. oceanographers say a year from now we ll see things that easily float, like boats, wood from houses and plastic children s toys. two years out, fishing supplies and nets will come ashore. and after three years, shoes, plastic furniture, even entire dining sets. so you have to imagine a city, say the size of seattle, put it through a grinder and what happens? you wind up with all kinds of debris. reporter: sad reminders of a disaster so enormous parts of japan will finally come to rest half a world away. neal karlinsky, abc news, tokyo. donald trump is turning up the heat over president obama s birth certificate once