Frank Schubert, President of Mission Public Affairs, in California's FlashReport:

After months of very carefully managing expectations about his “evolving” position on gay marriage, President Obama suddenly found himself last week careening between powerful forces like the steel ball in Elton John’s “pinball wizard.” His own Vice President threw him into the pinball machine, and then his Education Secretary thrust the plunger, launching him into game.

... The left is jumping for joy at their accomplishment, forcing President Obama out of the closet on gay marriage. Their celebration will be short-lived, though, because they have very likely cost him the presidency.

The presidential election is not going to be decided in states like California where George Clunie and Nancy Pelosi are cheering President Obama’s gay marriage “evolution,” but based on how voters in a series of swing states cast their ballots – states like North Carolina, Florida, Ohio, Virginia, Colorado and Nevada. President Obama and his buddies on the left have thrust the issue of same-sex marriage front and center in these swing states. How is that going to play? Not well for Obama.

The average margin of victory among these six swing states on marriage amendment votes was 61.33%, which almost precisely matches the vote that North Carolina voters cast last week in favor of their marriage amendment. That’s a far bigger majority than any candidate for president could ever hope to achieve in these states. Keep in mind, too, that some of the same activists who urged President Obama to endorse gay marriage were predicting the weekend before the North Carolina vote that the marriage amendment would fail. (This includes gay marriage activists and media activists at the New York Times, among other publications.) Instead, a broad and deep coalition of voters, including a plurality of Democrats, a majority of Independents and an overwhelming majority of Republicans and African Americans supported the marriage amendment.