Obama defends program he admits won't work

Just days after declaring its proposed long-term care program too expensive to implement, the Obama administration on Monday insisted that it would fight any Republican efforts to repeal the program that was a key component of the president’s sweeping health care reforms.

The Community Living Assistance Services and Supports program, or Class Act, was to provide long-term care insurance for aging workers and would have been financed through workers’ voluntary contributions. After 19 months of trying to implement the program, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Friday that she was dropping the program because there was no way to make it work financially.