The real issues I don't think most people touch. The Clinton jokes are all about Monica Lewinsky and all that stuff and not about the important thing… - Tom Lehrer

The real issues I don't think most people touch. The Clinton jokes are all about Monica Lewinsky and all that stuff and not about the important things, like the fact that he wouldn't ban landmines.

I'm not tempted to write a song about George W. Bush. I couldn't figure out what sort of song I would write. That's the problem: I don't want to satirise George Bush and his puppeteers, I want to vaporise them. … And that's not funny. … OK, well, if I say that, I might get a shock laugh, but it's not really satire.

I ache for the touch of your lips, dear, But much more for the touch of your whips, dear. You can raise welts Like nobody else, As we dance to the Masochism Tango.

Oh, the white folks hate the black folks, And the black folks hate the white folks; To hate all but the right folks Is an old established rule.

I don’t think this kind of thing [satire] has an impact on the unconverted, frankly. It’s not even preaching to the converted; it’s titillating the converted. I think the people who say we need satire often mean, ‘We need satire of them, not of us.’ I’m fond of quoting Peter Cook, who talked about the satirical Berlin cabarets of the ’30s, which did so much to stop the rise of Hitler and prevent the Second World War.