The Borderlands of Sympathy Mesa is a massive, environmentally stunning nation, ruled by Wenis the Eviscerator with a fair hand, and remarkable for its daily referendums, state-planned economy, and soft-spoken computers. The compassionate, democratic population of 1.049 billion Sympathy Mesans 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 Education, Administration, and Healthcare. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Halcyon. The average income tax rate is 87.9%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The very strong Sympathy Mesan economy, worth 90.8 trillion souls 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 Book Publishing and Cheese Exports. Average income is 86,554 souls, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Exorbitant spending on icebreakers breaks the ice at every budget meeting, where there's a will there is usually a password manager, the new Refuse Hills housing development is under construction, and a niche industry catering to S&M enthusiasts has sprung up. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Sympathy Mesa's national animal is the European polecat, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, and its national religion is Kelpism.

Sympathy Mesa is ranked 79,799^th in the world and 3,518^th in The North Pacific for Largest Publishing Industry, scoring 3,233.52 on the Bella Potter Productivity e-Index.