But we can look to states like Washington - where there were 2 votes - 3 years apart on gay unions. One established domestic partnerships with all the state-granted rights and responsibilities of marriage. The other legalized same sex marriage.

They both passed with nearly identical results. To me that indicates that a pretty large percentage (at least in Washington) of the electorate that opposes same-sex marriage, opposed anything - no matter what it's called.

Yes, there are some people who really are concerned about the name of the relationship, and he might be one of them. However, based to the Washington results, they seem to be in the vast minority of those who oppose same sex marriage.

While everything you wrote is basically true, there's perhaps another detail of Washington and Oregon politics to consider - the west and east are completely divided politically in both states. For example, if you were to look at another divisive issue like the legalization of marijuana, you'd probably find that exactly the same counties in Washington voted against it as that voted against same-sex marriage. Eastern Washington and eastern Oregon are rural, agrarian, religious, and significantly Republican compared to urban, wealthy, etc Portland and Seattle. So, when you look at issues like this is isn't just "a pretty large percentage of the electorate" but rather a geopolitical divide that runs straight down the Cascades.

> The logic behind prop 8 is that if you clearly define marriage as a union between one man and one woman, with no exceptions, then you are leaving homosexuals with no other alternative than to form some kind of alternate terminology, such as the civil union.

I just don't get this, so please explain if you can as you seem to have some insight here: why does marriage have to be between a man and a women? Why can't gay people be "married"? Why does it affect anyone else if they do?

>why does marriage have to be between a man and a women?

You're misunderstanding me. I think gay people should be allowed to marry. I was illustrating the rationale behind proposition 8. Its supporters knew that they didn't have the support that was needed in order to outright ban homosexual unions, and so they wanted to at least prevent them from calling those unions 'marriages'. If they were successful in excluding homosexual relationships from their constitutional definition of marriage, then they would have successfully forced homosexuals to call their marriages something else.

I am not saying I agree with this, but allowing gay people to be married gives them rights to adopt children. If you believe that the foundation of society is traditional family and that children should be raised, when possible, in a traditional family, you could see why someone would appose gay marriage.