Well, the key element here comes down to the tax breaks and benefits, which is what it's always been about more than anything. The idea being that these benefits exist due to the assumpsion that a married couple is going to have kids, and for it to make it easier to raise a family. Alternate systems of obtaining children which gays can take advantage of, such as adoption, foster care, etc... already include their own systems of benefits which exist parallel to this (and tend to be abused, especially the foster system).
The law was pretty much designed so that states that wanted to legalize gay marriage could do so, and take their own responsibility for that, but other states wouldn't have to worry about picking up the tab. It's actually a pretty fair way of doing things from a legal perspective, though it's understandable why certain people who might want to move do not like it.
At the end of the day it's one of those cases where whether your anti-gay, or pro-gay, this isn't about the sexuality, it's about the money. In general if your state winds up having to pay benefits to gay couples that's a problem, especially if your state has been unable to balance it's budget to begin with (as many haven't) and that means a tax hike for you to pay for it. While a lot of liberals might be all excited about paying an extra 1 or 2% of their paycheck each week/month so gay people can get benefits, not everyone, including a lot of liberals, are going to see it that way.
When it comes to things like power of Attorney and things like that, it's already been addressed in most cases. Hospitals for example will generally allow things to defer to a "life partner" rather than a spouse due to the problems raised.
I'm NOT going to argue or debate the point here, just spelling it out. That said I can see why a number of companies have gone forward with it as a PR move, especially seeing as they don't have any real vested losses in the situation if it goes through. I'd imagine if they passed the law but on the condition that these big companies become entirely responsible for paying out the benefits from their own profits while agreeing to goverment mandated price fixing to prevent them from raising product costs to pass the costs on to the people anyway, there would be a mad rush to distance themselves from the policy.
One of the reasons why the USA got into so much crap financially is that we tend not to think ahead to the cost of all of these principles and social programs/reforms. It's all great on paper until the bill comes up and someone has to pay for it, the goverment doesn't get it's money magically, it comes from you. "The goverment can afford tax breaks, it's rich" well news flash, our economy is in the toilet, we're talking a possible goverment shut down. People are already worried about taxes exploding when people are having trouble making ends meet as it is without adding another variable.
To my way of thinking this is an issue that should be tabled until the US is in better shape, as should many others. When we're talking about having to let prisoners out of jail because we can't afford to run the prisons, it's hard to care about paying to make a symbolic point.
My attitude, and as I said, I'm not going to debate this or argue, just say my piece and move on. I have a pretty good idea what most of the people on these forums think about this anyway.
