I think the idea that giving up a social agenda (which actually does provide Republicans with a popular vote base) to focus on being "fiscally conservative" is misguided, because it presumes that republicans actually are fiscal conservatives.
The republican party hasn't been fiscally conservative for decades-check out the budget deficits and national debt from Reagan on. Government spending has soared to unimaginable heights under the most recent round of republican leadership.
The difference is that democrats tend to spend government money on programs to garner more popular votes: if you come up with a welfare or medicare program, that might benefit a few million people. You have some serious vote power from that.
On the other hand, spending all the public's money on weapons systems, wars, and a byzantine security apparatus (think Homeland Security and the much ridiculed TSA baggies on airplanes), garners almost no votes. The employees who work in these industries are not numerous enough to swing an election, and all of the contracts tend to amount to welfare when you consider the "service" being purchased with public money.
This is the fundamental conservative problem in America: the party of conservatives has become a socialist party just like the democrats, but it spends all its government bonus on a relatively narrow sector. When the economy was fine, that was all well and good, and the social/moral/character themes were more than enough to supply the party with votes....but now that large numbers of people are feeling a pinch, they're obviously going to vote for the party that is more likely to spend public money in their favor.
