The Second Best Colony of Second Best Puppet 55 is a colossal, cultured nation, ruled by Noah with an even hand, and remarkable for its closed borders, deadly medical pandemics, and infamous sell-swords. The hard-nosed, hard-working, humorless, devout population of 6.846 billion Second Best Puppet 55ians 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, moralistic government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Industry, and Administration. The average income tax rate is 89.9%.

The frighteningly efficient Second Best Puppet 55ian economy, worth a remarkable 1,164 trillion cards a year, is fairly diversified and led by the Retail industry, with significant contributions from Book Publishing, Information Technology, and Beef-Based Agriculture. Black market activity is rampant. Average income is an impressive 170,057 cards, and evenly distributed, with the richest citizens earning only 3.7 times as much as the poorest.

Residents of new housing subdivisions complain about the total absence of supermarkets and restaurants, any body part that can be cut off a person is no longer considered to be their property, news headlines usually include p-values, and the best way to be heard in politics is to speak softly and carry a big comedy prop. 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 55's national animal is the legendary, which is also the nation's favorite main course.

Second Best Puppet 55 is ranked 78,246^th in the world and 196^th in Two for Largest Populations, with 6.85 billion capita.