The Principality of Grindstone is a gargantuan, orderly nation, remarkable for its anti-smoking policies, compulsory military service, and restrictive gun laws. The hard-nosed, hard-working, cynical, humorless, devout population of 15.962 billion GrindstoneanNs 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, corrupt, moralistic, well-organized government is primarily concerned with Defense, with Law & Order and Spirituality also on the agenda, while Social Policy and Welfare receive no funds. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Grindstone Castle. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 43.0%.

The powerhouse GrindstoneanA economy, worth a remarkable 1,294 trillion Latinums a year, is highly specialized and led by the Uranium Mining industry, with significant contributions from Arms Manufacturing, Beef-Based Agriculture, and Trout Farming. Black market activity is rampant. State-owned companies are reasonably common. Average income is 81,112 Latinums, but there is an enormous disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 467,793 per year while the poor average 6,725, a ratio of 69.6 to 1.

Rag-wearing teachers are often mistaken for homeless people, ship captains always order a return to port at the slightest sign of rain, patriots insist that size does matter, and the nation refuses to discard its increasingly useless penny. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a very well-funded police force. Grindstone's national animal is the Eagle, which is also the nation's favorite main course.

Grindstone is ranked 283,649^th in the world and 4^th in Isolation for Highest Foreign Aid Spending, scoring -15.81 on the Clooney Contribution Index.