Millions of everyone stays home in an election. The myth of Evangelicals skipping out in 2012 is just that: a myth. I am surprised you bought that that shit from Huckabee. Here is a good article on that:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...evangelical-turnout-but-he-has-a-good-reason/
You claim the GOP doesn't make an appeal to the religious right, yet "traditional marriage" and anti-abortion language was front and center in the GOP platform adopted for the 2012 election, which was the exact point I was making. I mean, you can google it if you want.
McCain chose a running mate to placate the religious right. Romeny, hahaha...Evangelical Christians overwhelmingly voted for Romeny, even though he is a high-ranking member of a false cult. Now why would that be? Could it be because the GOP (again) hammers home the message to the Thumpers?
It's nothing new, and was planned to be this way. Reagan melded the Nixon strategy of appealing to racist Southerners with an appeal to evangelicals...who were dumb enough to forget he was running against one of the most Christian men to ever occupy the White House. The problem was Carter also believed in the Constitution and did not want a damn theocracy, hence Falwell (a true son of a bitch if there ever was one) hatched a plan with Jesse Helms (a true bigot if there ever was one) to meld the two, hence the big swing of the South to the GOP that continues. Reagan jumped all over, dropping the dog-whistle of "states' rights" in the South while claiming to be some sort of more Christian than Carter (while married to a woman who, by her belief in Astrology, was damn near a Satanist).
And this strategy has continued, as I earlier noted. Now, you can certainly argue the powers in the GOP really don't care about the Evangelicals, as they never manage to achieve their goals. And I would agree. There is a reason for that; as Sidney Blumenthal noted, the strategy is to keep them somewhat unsatisfied so they are "in a state of perpetual mobilization." And I predict we will very soon see this come to the front of the GOP race. We will hear the old lines about "judicial activism" on gay marriage, with promises to choose new justices to get that shit overturned. Unless it is Trump, who believes in God about as much as I believe in the Tooth Fairy, and given his youthful partaking in cocaine-fueled orgies has likely sucked a dick or two.