The Daily Caller

The Daily Caller
 MIAMI - JANUARY 18: Dr. Olveen Carrasquillo, Chief of General Internal Medicine University of Miami, conducts a checkup on Juan Gonzalez at the University of Miami's Miller School of Medicine, as the United States House Republicans in Washington, DC were poised to approve a bill repealing the health care law that last year was signed into law overhauling the U.S. health care system on January 18, 2011 in Miami, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)  

Obamacare’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad year

2011 was supposed to be a bad year for President Obama’s , with House Republicans taking aim and federal lawsuits snaking their way through the judiciary. And although the House of Representatives has had limited success in dismantling the overhaul, key portions began to unravel all by themselves.

Here’s a look at the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act’s year in review.

– Jan. 14: Kansas announces its intention to become the 26th state to file suit against the federal government to stop implementation of the overhaul.

– Jan. 19: The House of Representatives votes to repeal the health care law.

– Jan. 26: Illinois-based pharmaceutical company Abbott Labs cuts 1,900 jobs “in response to changes in the health-care industry, including U.S. health-care reform and the challenging regulatory environment.”

– Jan. 31: A second federal district judge -unconstitutional/">rules that the law is unconstitutional.

– Feb. 2: All 47 Republican senators vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act, but the measure fails.

– Feb. 16: Health and Human Services Secretary testifies before the Senate Finance Committee and admits that the CLASS Act, a key portion of the law that was touted as a $70 billion savings, is “totally unsustainable.” But not to worry: Sebelius says her department has the authority to rework the legislation to make CLASS tenable.

– Feb. 18: The House votes to block federal funding to implement the Affordable Care Act. The Congressional Budget Office also estimates that repealing the law would add $210 billion to the combined federal deficits from 2012 to 2021.

– Feb. 22: A federal judge tosses a lawsuit claiming that the Affordable Care Act violates the liberties of those who choose to rely on God to protect and heal them instead of buying .

– March 3: The House votes to end an unpopular tax paperwork-filing requirement for businesses tucked into the health care law.

– March 23: The law turns one year old. On the same day, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce finds that the temporary Early Retirement Reinsurance Program will spend its allotted $5 billion far earlier than its Jan. 1, 2014 expiration date.

– March 30: The CBO estimates that health care reform will cost $1.1 trillion, an increase of $90 billion from its February estimate.

– May 17: The Daily Caller reports that 20 percent of new waivers from the law have gone to gourmet restaurants, nightclubs and fancy hotels in former House Speaker ’s district.

– June 8: A McKinsey & Company survey of over 1,300 private sector employers found that 30 percent of employers would definitely or probably stop offering insurance to their employees after the law is implemented in 2014.

– June 18: HHS announces that it is axing waivers from the law.

– June 21: A glitch in the law, discovered after Obama signed it, would allow middle-class Americans to get subsidized health care intended for poor people, the Associated Press reports. ’s chief actuary says the policy “doesn’t make sense.”

– June 29: In the face of a constitutional challenge, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals rules in favor of the law.

– July 18: An Employment Policies Institute report finds that the Affordable Care Act would incentivize employees to switch to a government-subsidized insurance exchange even if employers were to continue their health care coverage, costing taxpayers “significant[ly].”

– July 19: The bipartisan “gang of six” puts forward a debt-reduction plan that would repeal the CLASS Act.