For weeks we’ve seen “experts” telling us that Greece will be an isolated event. That it could have an impact elsewhere in Europe, but it shouldn’t have any bearing on the US or Australia (Australia’s different you see).

Then at the start of this week talk of contagion started to do the rounds. But again, maybe Europe and the UK will go pear-shaped, but that’s all. We’ll be fine. Our lovely banks don’t have any Greek exposure.

But now today we’ve got “abyss” being used.

That’s hardly surprising considering the deep mess Greece and the European Union is in. And quite frankly it’s something that should be taken seriously.

We’re not talking about common-all-garden riots here. We’re not talking about World Economic Forum style riots with a few bags of flour being thrown and the odd urine water bomb splashing across the old bill.

It’s not the type of riot where the participants turn up for a bit of copper baiting and argy-bargy, fully expecting to return to their day job in the call centre on Monday morning. From what we can see it’s yer proper lootin’ and a killin’ civil unrest.

But we’ll see. You never know, it could all blow over before you know it. However, we’d want pretty decent odds if we were going to place a bet on it.

So who’s to blame for the Greek mess? Are the Greeks behaving like spoilt brats? Do they deserve the punishment that’s being dealt to them? Haven’t they received all the benefits of government largesse?

It won’t surprise you to learn that we firmly place the blame on the government. Sure, the Greek public aren’t completely innocent, thinking they could have something for nothing. But when it comes down to it, the prime reason for the current mess is the politicians and their insatiable appetite for power.

I’m afraid it’s the nature of the political beast. And it’s why we believe in a minimalist government.

The more powers that politicians are granted, the more they’ll want. The more they get to control things, the more they’ll want to control other things.

Eventually it reaches a tipping point. The government ends up having its fingers in so many pies its actions have the biggest impact on the fortunes of the economy. You can see that in Greece, and you can see that in, er, Australia…

Just look at what the Fairy Ruddfather has done to the markets this week. The impact has only been this big due to the excessive influence of government.

And it adds further evidence to support our claim that Australia does not operate a truly free market. In a free market with limited government, the government would not have this kind of power and could therefore not make these decisions.

As we’ve pointed out all along, it is the excesses of government that is the overwhelming negative influence on the economy, not free enterprise.

The front page of today’s Australian Financial Review (AFR) has political hack Laura Tingle leading with:

“The war of words over the resource super profits tax has overshadowed how the Henry review has presented the government with a new fiscal policy lever to control the economy. The lever is a new tax which, as a macro-economic policy, could reweight the way the economy works.”

To free-marketeers that kind of statement is enough to make you drop your copy of The Wealth of Nations into your bowl of cornflakes of a morning.

We love the last part especially; it “could reweight the way the economy works.”

See what I mean about the obsession for hapless bureaucrats and politicians to control things? They just can’t help themselves.

The idea that the Resource Super Profits Tax is a new lever to control the economy is just plain madness. But again, it’s the overconfidence of bureaucrats who believe they saved the Australian economy from disaster.

We’d love to hear from Ms. Tingle her explanation of how economies work. Our guess is that she believes it involves politicians and bureaucrats pulling and pushing levers like an old signalman.

Clearly Ms. Tingle and other government and tax lovers have some bizarre idea that economies can be directed at the whim of bureaucrats just as a child can control a toy train set.

In fact, in a Money Morning exclusive, below is a photo we secretly took this morning of a government bureaucrat in action - not surprisingly he’s sitting down on the job (probably an occupational health and safety thing):