> If the general public is that stupid

What is your evidence that propaganda efficacy scales inversely with intelligence?

An interesting parallel, they've studied cult recruitment and intelligent people are not less likely to join one. In fact, often times, the better they are at reasoning, the better they are at convincing themselves something bad is in fact ok.

It's self-evident. Propaganda is defused through rhetorical skills. You know, knowing about the general forms of sophism, all that stuff. Rhetorical skills correlate with intelligence.