The United States of Dark lighting is a huge, cultured nation, notable for its frequent executions and compulsory military service. The devout population of 649 million Dark lightingians 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 relatively small government juggles the competing demands of Education, Welfare, and Spirituality. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of The dark realm. The average income tax rate is 11.8%, but much higher for the wealthy.

The sizeable but inefficient Dark lightingian economy, worth 33.4 trillion eggshells a year, is broadly diversified and led by the Trout Farming industry, with major contributions from Information Technology, Tourism, and Retail. State-owned companies are common. Average income is 51,461 eggshells, and evenly distributed, with the richest citizens earning only 2.2 times as much as the poorest.

Taxpayer money is hard at work exorcizing laundry, crops are flattened as farmers bludgeon insects to death, re-education centers are being added to most prisons, and clerics are taught that silence is golden and duct tape is silver. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown. Dark lighting's national animal is the Kiwi bird, which soars majestically through the nation's famously clear skies.

Dark lighting is ranked 195,510^th in the world and 50^th in Sparkalia for Rudest Citizens, with 41.11 insults per minute.