The Republic of ZMC09 is a huge, pleasant nation, remarkable for its multi-spousal wedding ceremonies, fear of technology, and suspicion of poets. The hard-nosed population of 510 million ZMC09ians 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 enormous, moralistic government juggles the competing demands of Defense, Law & Order, and Administration. The average income tax rate is 67.2%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The strong ZMC09ian economy, worth 24.4 trillion dollars a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. However, for those in the know, there is a large, well-organized, quite specialized black market in Arms Manufacturing, Woodchip Exports, and Basket Weaving. The private sector mostly consists of enterprising ten-year-olds selling lemonade on the sidewalk, but the government is looking at stamping this out. Average income is 47,872 dollars, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Motorists must pay to enter inner-cities during peak hours, the government funds private schools for intellectually gifted children, the roads are notorious throughout the region for their peril, and government officials have to mortgage their homes to make ends meet. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. ZMC09's national animal is the cobra, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to widespread deforestation.

ZMC09 is ranked 272,007^th in the world and 28^th in RegionZ for Most Scientifically Advanced, scoring -16.24 on the Kurzweil Singularity Index.