The contemporary scandal, it is often said, is not that criminal corruption occurs but rather that the political system is legally rigged. It supposedly takes the form of campaign contributions that, Mr. Sanders says, enable corporations to “literally buy elections.”

An example of bacillary infection is anthrax.

Then I saw we were not growing deep because we were not going wide.

If what we have are not fetishes to be critiqued, but factishes that are hybrids that have complex effects, then we must exercise caution and care both in relation to critiquing and creating factishes.