How do you read Tom Lehrer's song "Smut"?

I've been listening to a lot of Tom Lehrer recently because I've been trying to write comedic songs for my comedy writing class at the Second City and are you still reading this sentence?, because it's not getting any better.

Let's cut to the chase: Lehrer is very ironic and often political--is there a way that his political irony supports some actual political position? Or is his irony critical of any political position? Does it have answers? Or only questions?

(It occurs to me also that Jonathon Coulton is not so much a Snuggie, as opined by a Planet Money guest host, as he is an apolitical Tom Lehrer, making catchy funny songs out of nerdy things. Coulton's "Re: Your Brains" is a funny song about a terrible coworker-turned-zombie, but it's not as acid-pointed as Lehrer's "Wernher von Braun," about the Nazi scientist-turned US scientist whose "allegiance is ruled by expedience.")

Let's take Lehrer's most ambivalent song, "Smut," a song that defends pornography because it's fun, not because it's a freedom of speech issue. Here's how the song goes:

(If you need help following the words, here are the lyrics.)

So, what do you think of that? Does Tom Lehrer support pornography or does he support limitations on pornography?

We don't get any help from Lehrer's tonal choice or from his rhyme choice. That is, wouldn't it be great if the use of slant rhymes and forced rhymes showed that Lehrer was being ironic? Well, unfortunately this song features a mix of forced rhymes ("uncut / unsubt...le") and perfect rhymes ("quibbled / ribald / nibbled"). So we're not getting any help there.

(And doesn't Alan Moore's Lost Girls seem like an expansion of the lines about Peter Pan and the Wizard of Oz being a dirty old man?)

Lehrer really digs in here, to the point where a First Amendment-supporter (or any American bourgeoisie) might be uncomfortable: are you sure you want to be on the side of hardcore, the obscene, the "lurid, licentious, and vile," the dirty, slime, the indecent, the filthy, etc.? Lehrer rings through a lot of terms that most people don't want to associate themselves with, especially in a public audience.

And this is why I think this song is really powerful. Because it's cheap and easy to support free speech, Lehrer wants to make it more expensive for us:

But now they're trying to take it all
away from us unless
We take a stand, and hand in hand
we fight for freedom of the press.
In other words,

Smut! (I love it)

Who doesn't want to be for freedom of the press? Everyone supports freedom of the press in the abstract. Supporting freedom of the press is easy, and there's nothing heroic about doing the easy thing, a joke that Lehrer drives home in the spoken intro to "The Folk Song Army":

You have to admire people who sing these songs. It takes a certain amount of courage to get up in a coffee-house or a college auditorium and come out in favor of the things that everybody else in the audience is against like peace and justice and brotherhood and so on. 

But when Lehrer sings, "freedom of the press. / In other words, / Smut!," he's making our support of the First Amendment a little more costly to us by showing the connection: "freedom of the pres"="smut!" So if we totally support the First Amendment (of course, I do, what a ridiculous question!), then we support the free speech rights of pornography (oh, hold on a minute).

So where does Lehrer fall on that issue?

I'm not actually sure; I could say that he supports free speech, but that's partly because I want him to fall in line with my thoughts. (Which is often a problem of interpretive criticism: we want our favorite creative types to share our feelings. That's one reason I love H. P. Lovecraft: he keeps me honest since I can't pretend that he shares my politics.)

But I could also say that, in pointing out the connection (free speech = smut), Lehrer is hinting that we need some limitations on free speech. Or maybe he's implying that banning pleasure is a losing proposition? Or maybe, with that line about obscene "murals" and "stained glass windows," he's pointing out the class issues of prohibitive laws (oh, we can enjoy our ____ just fine, but those poor working-class slobs just can't be trusted with alcohol/porn/violent media/the vote)?

So, it seems to me that Lehrer poses some complicating questions, but I'm not sure he provides any answers. Is this the condition of all intersections between comedy and politics?