2012: KAL's view

January

1. A dropped pass and a missed field goal keep Joe Flacco and the Ravens out of the Super Bowl.

February

2. Las Vegas billionaire Sheldon Adelson becomes Mr. Super PAC by pumping millions into Newt Gingrich's presidential campaign.

3. Riots in Athens kick off a year of public unrest over the European debt crisis.

March

4. Federal regulators approve Chicago-based Exelon's takeover of Constellation Energy, leaving Baltimore without a Fortune 500 headquarters.

April

5. United Nations efforts to stop the civil war in Syria fail, with a shaky cease-fire giving way to fiercer bloodshed.

May

6. Michael Andretti and local investors take over the beleaguered Baltimore Grand Prix just three months before it is scheduled to take place.

7. The Baltimore Sun turns 175.

June

8. Baltimore Comptroller Joan Pratt questions the purchase of new, high-tech phones by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's administration, a dispute that devolves into a lawsuit.

9. U.S. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. provides the deciding vote to uphold the most controversial element of Obamacare, the individual mandate.

10. Dozens of tall ships crowd Baltimore's harbor for Sailabration, the kick-off of the city's commemoration of the War of 1812.

11. A report faults Penn State football coach Joe Paterno for covering up the child sex abuse committed by former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky.

July

12. A derecho blows through the Baltimore region, leaving hundreds of thousands without power for days during a heat wave.

13. A water main break in downtown Baltimore shuts down Light Street for days.

August

14. Gov. Martin O'Malley, Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller and House Speaker Michael E. Busch push through a gambling expansion bill. After a $95 million advertising war between two casino companies, voters approve the plan.

15. Baltimore Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld III retires. He is replaced by California law enforcement veteran Anthony Batts.

16. Baltimore's Michael Phelps becomes the most decorated Olympian of all time, winning two silver medals and four gold in the London Olympics.

September

17. Mother Jones Magazine publishes a video of Mitt Romney disparaging 47 percent of the population as lazy and dependent. President Barack Obama meanwhile insists that taxes be raised on the top 2 percent of earners.

18. An attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, kills four Americans.

October

19. The Orioles host the first playoff game at Camden Yards in 15 years.

20. Hurricane Sandy pounds New York and New Jersey. Mayor Michael Bloomberg and others point to that storm and others as proof that we need to tackle climate change.

November

21. President Barack Obama easily wins re-election, defeating Republican Mitt Romney.

22. Voters in Maryland, Maine and Washington approve gay marriage.

23. CIA Director David Petraeus resigns after an FBI investigation uncovers his affair with his biographer.

24. Palestinian terrorists launch rockets at Israeli cities, and Israel responds with an air offensive against Hamas targets in Gaza.

25. The University of Maryland ditches its decades-old association with the Atlantic Coast Conference for greener (in the fiscal sense, anyway) pastures in the Big Ten.

December

26. President Obama and House Republicans careen toward the fiscal cliff — a combination of mandatory tax increases and spending cuts.

27. After a series of articles detailing problems with Baltimore City's speed camera program, The Sun reports on the case of a man who got a ticket while stopped at a red light.

28. A gunman, after killing his mother, enters Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., and kills 26 more people — including 20 children — plunging the country into mourning and leading to a national call for stricter gun laws.