The fresh-faced ensemble cast that performs Mental Missiles, a political musical revue included as part of the Impact Festival, collaborated with Elizabeth Swados to develop a series of satirical songs, sketches and monologues to skewer nearly every sacred cow or public foible. Like an episode of “The Daily Show” set to music, the dozen performers rap about Guantanamo Bay abuses, racism, Hurricane Katrina, global warming and DIY abortion all with a smile and a snicker. It would be a useless attempt if they stuck to the easy path: singing “Richard Cheney is a motherf*cker” gets a laugh, but it doesn’t raise consciousness—the point of this newly minted politically-minded theater festival. So to get there, Utkarsh Ambudkar plays the acoustic guitar for “Flight School Dropout,” and sings, “My father would be ashamed/I’m the first man in my family who hasn’t died from crashing a plane;” and then there’s the “Cancer Song” in which a racist, homophobic woman sings, “Now that I have cancer, everybody has to love me … People say you change when you have cancer, but I haven’t … so you better like me.” Now that’s what I call pushing buttons.

Through Oct. 14. Culture Project, 45 Bleecker St. (betw. Lafayette & Bowery), 212-352-3101; Fri.-Sat. 10 p.m., Sun. 7 p.m., $15. www.impactfestival.org.