The Armed Republic of Hardwater is a colossal, safe nation, remarkable for its zero percent divorce rate, triple-decker prams, and anti-smoking policies. The devout population of 2.928 billion Hardwatians are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The enormous, socially-minded government juggles the competing demands of Administration, Education, and Industry. The average income tax rate is 69.8%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The very strong Hardwatian economy, worth 189 trillion crosses a year, is quite specialized and led by the Arms Manufacturing industry, with major contributions from Tourism, Basket Weaving, and Uranium Mining. Black market activity is notable. State-owned companies are common. Average income is 64,390 crosses, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Drugs containing the compound "oleum de serpens" are being sold to cancer patients, honeymoon suites can be located by following newlywed couples' shrieks of "what's that?", the government takes agricultural advice from a wasp-themed superhero, and rotary phones are considered cutting-edge technology. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Hardwater's national animal is the siberian cat, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to widespread deforestation.

Hardwater is ranked 164,025^th in the world and 4^th in Unsavory Group of Bad Hombres for Least Corrupt Governments, with 93.02 percentage of bribes refused.