Pornography is often tasteless. It can debase women and cheapen sexual intimacy. But should it be one of the U.S. attorney general’s top priorities?

According to a story in The Washington Post on Tuesday, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is launching a new FBI squad to go after the “manufacturers and purveyors” of pornography.

The new squad, which will include eight agents, a supervisor and support staff, is not targeting child pornographers. It’s taking direct aim at a legal business featuring consenting adults that markets and sells its products to other consenting adults.

Current federal obscenity law says that for pornography to be illegal, it must offend community standards, be made only with a prurient purpose and lack artistic merit.

Pornography has come a long way since the last federal push against it during the Reagan administration. The Internet and cable and satellite television bring streams of pornography straight into people’s homes, where it’s unlikely to offend the “community,” which will never see it sitting on a shelf at an adult bookstore or behind the counter at a gas station.

The adult entertainment industry has also gained a note of mainstream acceptance. Porn stars write books, transition to non-porn movies and even make it onto television.

As The Washington Post reports, the porn squad has become something of a joke among some FBI agents. The newspaper quotes one agent as saying, “I guess this means we’ve won the war on terror.”

It would be easy to poke fun at Gonzales’ porn squad, but it’s not funny that FBI resources are being diverted from tracking down terrorists, going after corrupt public officials, corporate cheats and other more serious threats to investigate a legal – if smarmy – industry.