The Republica of Mireand is a massive, genial nation, ruled by Mitos Hantove with an iron fist, and renowned for its barren, inhospitable landscape, public floggings, and irreverence towards religion. The compassionate, cynical population of 2.172 billion Mireandians are kept under strict control by the oppressive government, which measures its success by the nation's GDP and refers to individual citizens as "human resources."

The large, moralistic, well-organized government juggles the competing demands of Administration, Industry, and Defense. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Micuran. The average income tax rate is 46.4%, but much higher for the wealthy.

The thriving Mireandian economy, worth 144 trillion Micupes a year, is broadly diversified and led by the Trout Farming industry, with major contributions from Information Technology, Soda Sales, and Book Publishing. State-owned companies are reasonably common. Average income is 66,170 Micupes, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Grinding bureaucracy has the international wheels of justice turning slowly, delivery truck companies use hospital parking lots to store 16-wheelers, fans doing the wave routinely disrupt the finals of Go tournaments, and teenagers performing appendectomies on their friends has become a popular schoolyard prank. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a capable police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Mireand's national animal is the Bear, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to widespread deforestation.

Mireand is ranked 86,457^th in the world and 376^th in The Communist Bloc for Most Developed, scoring 65.39 on the Human Development Index.