The New Horizons of Greater New Cassandra is a massive, genial nation, ruled by President Cassandra Celeste with a fair hand, and notable for its keen interest in outer space, smutty television, and stringent health and safety legislation. The compassionate, democratic population of 1.787 billion Cassandrians are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The government — a sprawling, bureaucracy-choked, socially-minded morass — juggles the competing demands of Administration, Education, and Environment. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Basilreef. The average income tax rate is 93.2%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The powerhouse Cassandrian economy, worth 174 trillion star fragments a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. The industrial sector, which is highly specialized, is mostly made up of the Information Technology industry, with significant contributions from Tourism and Book Publishing. Average income is 97,672 star fragments, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Populations of two-headed barn owls have been found around recently-uncovered archaeological sites, employers are keenest on employees who lack family values, the election for President Cassandra Celeste's office's janitor is heating up, and the comic book series 'President Cassandra Celeste and the Villainous Corporate Cronies' is a best-seller. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Greater New Cassandra's national animal is the barn owl, which soars majestically through the nation's famously clear skies, and its national religion is Agnostic.

Greater New Cassandra is ranked 9,803^rd in the world and 311^th in The East Pacific for Most Advanced Public Education, scoring 10,944.29 on the Edu-tellignce® Test Score.