A delusional GOP still thinks that they are fundamentally sound, refusing to recognize that their fundamentalist sound is making a resounding thud everywhere it gets heard in their policies, legislation, and rhetoric. They think that their message doesn’t need to change, that they just need to tweak it a bit. If they just don’t talk about Rape…

A ruthless sobriety about the party’s failures seems almost in vogue.

“We did get whipped in the presidential election,” Mississippi committee member Henry Barbour told reporters Thursday. “That’s not something we take lightly.”

There was some talk about the policy missteps the party made in the past election, at least in terms of perception. “We must stop being the stupid party. It’s time for a new Republican party that talks like adults,” said Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal at his keynote dinner address Thursday night. “It’s time for us to articulate our plans and visions for America in real terms. We had a number of Republicans damage the brand this year with offensive and bizarre comments. We’ve had enough of that.”

GOP: We need to be ‘cheerful’

But it’s been long enough since the election that the mood here isn’t funereal. As grueling as the trudge back to victory may be, attendees say that too much self-reflective moroseness would be contagious to the electorate.

“What we need to be able to do is get people excited about the cause, about what the Republican Party stands for so that they want to be involved regardless of who our nominee is,” said Steve Duprey, an RNC committeeman from New Hampshire.

Duprey, whose cheerful demeanor when traveling with GOP nominee John McCain in 2008 earned him the unofficial title of “Secretary of Fun,” says Republicans need to find ways to build the kind of excitement among the GOP grassroots that characterized the relentlessly optimistic Obama volunteers in the last election.

More: Down but Not Out, Republicans Regroup at RNC Winter Meeting - First Read