“A real populist can wreck havoc on both parties, probably splitting the R vote.”
One of the books that helped me really understand why I was conservative was written back in 1983 by Richard Viguerie, one of the leaders of the Conservative Right at the time.
He wrote “The Establishment vs The People: is a New Populist Revolt on The Way?”.
You can get the book for cheap on Amazon or perhaps it’s available at your local library. Som e of his talking points are a bit dated (considering the book was written 30 years ago) but all in all, the main gist of the message remains true.
The GOP could do quite well electorally if we’d heed Viguerie’s message.