You don't avoid this by reducing federal scope and giving it to local. Say you achieve that goal, and then a populist gets in anyway. What happens then? Obvious

You don't avoid this by reducing federal scope and giving it to local. Say you achieve that goal, and then a populist gets in anyway. What happens then? Obviously they increase the scope, as all populists have done once they achieved power. The way you avoid this altogether is by creating good material conditions for people. One way you create good material conditions is by removing corrupt, vampiric local governments that contribute the opposite. Local governments are creating the conditions for populism by causing negative sum policies to add up to global tragedy. Also, goodness isn't a binary switch, and goodness needs to be compared with the alternative. I'd add that reducing local government doesn't mean that federal government has to be large and bloated. I still want a lean federal government. I can also never pin down exactly what advocates of larger local government actually want. What powers and capabilities, specifically, should be removed from federal and done by local?