I don’t know about you, but I’m getting a lot of auto-response emails from folks in the investment world who are on vacation these days. Yes, the summer doldrums have set in, often leaving junior portfolio managers—without seniority, vacation time, school-age children, or much in the way of discretionary authority—to mind the store.

When something is confusing or incomprehensible, a person might say, “It’s all Greek to me.” Well, that’s exactly what investors have been saying for the past several days—in the market’s inimitable way. Despite promising economic and corporate news in the U.S., the headline risk from Europe has been just too much to bear. It is keeping the bulls at bay, and front and center for an encore performance is Greece.

Last week I noted that there wasn’t much new to say about the stock market and its drivers lately, but like washing your car tends to attract rain, my comments were immediately followed by anger-driven election results in France and Greece. Both of these elections were about a rejection of austerity mandates placed upon a citizenry already feeling severe pain. The thought process is, “If the U.S.