Jeff Koons on the Moon

Morale at 10 Downing Street is a delicate thing these days, what with partygate investigations and all. The introduction of three “happy or not” machines, which function more or less the way mood rings did in the 70s, hasn’t helped. “Staff in Downing Street have accused Boris Johnson’s new top team of ‘patronising them,’” reported The Times of London. “The terminals — normally installed in shops and airports — allow people to record whether they have had good or bad experiences by pressing brightly coloured buttons with either happy or sad faces on them.”

Ouch. “It’s treating people like idiots rather than professionals trying to do a job that can be very difficult and stressful at times,” one member of the staff told the newspaper. Another said, “It is a totally miserable place to work and if they need happiness machines to tell them that then it shows how out of touch they are.” In short, the button being collectively pushed currently at 10 Downing would appear to be: Not.