The Republic of Charles Puppet 16 is a huge, genial nation, renowned for its otherworldly petting zoo, soft-spoken computers, and compulsory military service. The compassionate population of 932 million Charles Puppet 16ians are highly moralistic and fiercely conservative, in the sense that they tend to believe most things should be outlawed. People who have good jobs and work quietly at them are lauded; others are viewed with suspicion.

The large, corrupt government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Defense, and Administration. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 69.2%.

The frighteningly efficient Charles Puppet 16ian economy, worth 96.7 trillion Coins a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. However, for those in the know, there is a slick, highly efficient black market in Tourism, Arms Manufacturing, Information Technology, and Trout Farming. The private sector mostly consists of enterprising ten-year-olds selling lemonade on the sidewalk, but the government is looking at stamping this out. Average income is an impressive 103,755 Coins, with the richest citizens earning 5.6 times as much as the poorest.

Museums offer moralization or your money back, the optimally efficient parking strategy for business commuters is referred to as the "traveling salesman problem", the government invades its allies more than its enemies, and student athletes gaze forlornly at abandoned Animalball fields. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a very well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Charles Puppet 16's national animal is the Animal, which is also the nation's favorite main course.

Charles Puppet 16 is ranked 21,045^th in the world and 2^nd in Charleslandia for Most Cultured, scoring 87 on the Snufflebottom-Wiggendum Pentatonic Scale.