We know, as a matter of historical fact, that Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party, despite being generally incompetent, unintelligent, irrational, superstitious and just plain insane, managed to take over a country of tens of millions of people from nothing, in the span of fifteen years.

A good case could be made that "incompetent, unintelligent, irrational, superstitious and just plain insane" applies as well to us modern-day westerners - at least, I can imagine a parallel 2009 where Nazis won World War 2 and marvel at the successes of democratic nations in the early 20th century despite them being "incompetent, unintelligent, irrational, superstitious and jew-ridden". Insanity can be hard to distinguish from up close.