I wish it *had* been due to principled conservatives staying home. If so, the party might actually have to move right in order to regain their votes. But since it was the swing voters we lost, the party bigwigs will simply continue drifting leftward in a vain attempt to out-Dem the Dems.
It's more a question of style than anything else. I think the party got too closely identified with a single region of the country, and we need to break out of that to win back seats in the midwest and Rockies, and even a few in the northeast.