We’re doomed. In Sunday’s Washington Post, national pundit Chris Cillizza put Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley’s name on his short list for U.S. president.

Granted, he’s talking about the 2016 race, not next year’s, and granted, Cillizza and others have ulterior motives for boosting O’Malley’s White House candidacy at this moment. Nevertheless, we Marylanders are doomed. Putting O’Malley on the presidential short list is like pouring jet fuel on a bonfire. And O’Malley’s burning ambition hardly needs additional stoking.

Making matters worse, in the same Post edition reporter John Wagner, a big O’Malley fan, wrote a lengthy puff piece applauding O’Malley’s return to the stage as a singing troubadour. The guitar-playing governor was wrong to tone down his band appearances, says Wagner. Forget that gravitas stuff, O’Malley can croon his way into the hearts of national voters and into the White House.

O’Malley for president? That will be the term-limited governor’s sole focus between now and the end of his tenure, and we’re his candidacy’s guinea pigs. So get ready for a steady diet of offshore windmills, tuition freezes, “Jobs Across Maryland” tours and feel-good all-things-to-all-people initiatives flowing from Annapolis. Also, “O’Malley’s March” will be playing soon in your neighborhood.

But the media aren’t dangling the White House in front of O’Malley because they love him or think he can win. It’s all about gay marriage, the national media’s foremost priority. The homosexual lobby is using last week’s gay marriage victory in New York to build momentum in other blue states, particularly Maryland.

Last March, gay marriage was cruising to victory in Maryland’s legislature until several black lawmakers, under pressure from black churches, withheld support. At the time, Gov. O’Malley said he’d sign the bill and he made some phone calls, but now the gay lobby wants more as it mounts next year’s push. “On the top of the [gay] advocates’ to-do list: Get the governor out front,” writes Baltimore Sun reporter Julie Bykowicz.

Additional strategies include getting African-American politicians to stand up to the black churches (good luck) and copying New York’s ploy of having wealthy pro-homosexual donors promise money to the re-election campaigns of state lawmakers who vote for the bill (this could be misinterpreted as a bribe if it wasn’t a cause championed by the media).

The gays want O’Malley to make gay marriage part of his 2012 legislative package, and they’re using both the carrot and the stick on the reluctant governor.

The carrot is the U.S. presidency. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo just boosted his chances for the 2016 nomination by pushing gay marriage, says the gay lobby, now O’Malley must do the same if he wants to keep up with Cuomo in the presidential sweepstakes.

The stick comes from media columnists like The Sun’s Dan Rodricks: “On extending marriage rights to same-sex couples, Mr. O’Malley is a nothing man. He supports ‘civil unions’ instead. He takes the lame position of pledging to sign a gay marriage law if it passes, but does little to nothing to make it happen.”

What’s a prospective presidential candidate to do? Copy Cuomo or play it safe? Yes, same-sex marriage is now the law in six states and D.C., but in most of these cases legalization was by narrow legislative votes or by narrow court decisions. Every time homosexual marriage goes to the voters it loses. Voters in 31 states, including California, believe marriage should be limited to a man and a woman. It’s also federal law.

But the gay lobby, led by the national media, doesn’t care about majority will. It’s on a mission to reshape public opinion and legalize same-sex marriage, no matter what. “The opponents have no case other than ignorance and misconception and prejudice,” writes The Post’s Richard Cohen. Gosh, doesn’t leave much room for objection based on sincere, religious conviction, does it?

O’Malley is trying to guess what the world will look like in 2016. New York’s Cuomo and Maryland’s Attorney General Doug Gansler both see gay marriage as a magic carpet to higher office. So they’re getting on board early.

But instead of 2016, maybe O’Malley should worry about November 2012, when Maryland voters decide an interesting array of items.

First, it seems highly likely that Maryland’s Dream Act, granting in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens under certain conditions will be on the 2012 ballot. Petitioners appear to have the 55,736 valid signatures needed for referendum, which will draw all the bill’s opponents to the polls.

Second, if the homosexual lobby pushes gay marriage through next year’s Assembly it’s a virtual certainty that it, too, will go to referendum on the 2012 ballot, likewise drawing all its opponents to the polls.

Finally, at the top of the 2012 ballot will be Barack Obama running for re-election, a guaranteed draw for Maryland’s black voters who will make up 21 percent to 25 percent of the total vote and, apparently, take a dim view of the Dream Act and gay marriage.

It doesn’t take a political scientist to figure out that this could be an explosive combination. And a presidential hopeful, who’s also the governor of Maryland, might not want to be standing too close when the explosion takes place.

Blair Lee is CEO of the Lee Development Group in Silver Spring and a regular commentator for WBAL radio. His column appears Fridays in The Gazette. His e-mail address is blair@leedg.com.