The Second Best Colony of Second Best Puppet 118 is a colossal, efficient nation, ruled by Noah with an even hand, and notable for its museums and concert halls, deadly medical pandemics, and public floggings. The hard-nosed, humorless, devout population of 8.195 billion Second Best Puppet 118ians have some civil rights, but not too many, enjoy the freedom to spend their money however they like, to a point, and take part in free and open elections, although not too often.

The large, corrupt government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Industry, and Administration. The average income tax rate is 94.1%.

The frighteningly efficient Second Best Puppet 118ian economy, worth a remarkable 1,719 trillion cards a year, is fairly diversified and mostly comprised of black market activity, especially in Retail, Information Technology, Woodchip Exports, and Book Publishing. State-owned companies are reasonably common. Average income is an amazing 209,802 cards, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

The ongoing space elevator construction project has elevated the national debt to all new levels, village elders are often called in to interpret voting outcomes in Parliament, mystics are claiming that a simultaneous rise in scepticism and education budgets is correlation rather than causation, and politicians are often referred to as thesauruses behind their backs. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Second Best Puppet 118's national animal is the legendary, which is also the nation's favorite main course.

Second Best Puppet 118 is ranked 10,154^th in the world and 61^st in Two for Most Advanced Public Transport, scoring 3,123.07 on the Societal Mobility Rating.