John McCormack reports in the Weekly Standard:

"The events in Maryland and Rhode Island seem to contradict all of the claims that social issues just don't matter like they used to. Polls show that younger voters support gay marriage more than older voters, but that demographic shift has not yet produced many victories for gay marriage in even some of the bluest states. Gay marriage been defeated legislatively in New York in 2009 and in New Jersey in 2010. Through referenda, voters repealed Maine's law in 2009 and invalidated the California state supreme court's ruling in 2008.

In Iowa, the third state (after Massachusetts and Connecticut) to have same-sex marriage imposed by court order, three Supreme Court judges were sacked in November because of their ruling. The only states that got gay marriage laws on the books though the legislative process are Vermont (2009) and New Hampshire (2010). (And New Hampshire now has a veto-proof majority of Republicans and will vote on repeal of gay marriage in January 2012, but it's not clear that the whole GOP caucus will vote for repeal.) We'll know soon enough if Rhode Island or Maryland join them or continue the trend of blue states against gay marriage."