"The Lesbian Couch," "What's in My Pants," "Homeless Shopping Spree" - these were standing features of "The Opie & Anthony Show" -- a marvelously puerile and entertaining radio show.

It's dead now. Viacom killed it ... through ineptitude.

Anyone with any passing familiarity with the show would know this was a program on the razor's edge. It needed to be watched -- by the boss and his boss and her boss -- carefully.

I was a fan of the show. I'll probably regret admitting that someday. The show was full of ethnic slurs, homophobia and misogyny. And in light of recent headlines, which I'll get to in a minute, the self-important are coming out of the woodwork to say how terrible it was and how glad they are that it is gone after three years on the air.

But I have to say, more often than not, it made me chuckle during my afternoon drive home from Manhattan. Yeah, sometimes it was offensive. But it was clever at times, too. Remember, just because someone is making biased jokes and comments doesn't mean you buy into them. And there is something to be said for ribald humor. Just ask Shakespeare.

These guys -- Gregg "Opie" Hughes and Anthony Cumia -- were full of it, too. They'd invite strippers into their studio and encourage them to perform sex acts with each other on the couch, which the jockeys would describe in vivid detail on the air. They'd get female listeners to call in, put the phone in their underwear, and well, that's as far as I'm going.

The show also would load up a bus with homeless folk from time to time, give them each $100, and transport them to a trendy shopping mall.

They even had a "Wiffleball Challenge" involving visiting porn stars, plastic bats ... and that's as far as I'll describe it.

This kind of stuff, outrageous as it sounds, was routine for the show. It represents the ongoing trend in radio, and TV for that matter, of getting more and more gritty. Howard Stern is the godfather for this "shock jock" genre.

And occasionally this stuff landed the show into hot water. Its promotion of the "Voyeur Bus," a mostly glass bus carting naked women through Manhattan, incurred the wrath of then New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. And a radio bit about incest won a fine from the Federal Communications Commission. Indeed, Opie and Anthony originated in Boston, where they were fired for falsely claiming the mayor died in a car accident -- as an April Fools joke.

But, despite intermittent moral outrage, the show was popular, especially among men 18-35 -- a favorite demographic for the media giants. The show was also very successful. It became nationally syndicated through 19 stations and amassed an audience of more than 10 million.

Last week, though, Opie and Anthony finally crossed the line.

They staged a "Sex for Sam" contest where couples won points for having sex at various New York landmarks. The winners got a trip to the Sam Adams brewery in Boston. Jim Koch, the chairman of Boston Beer and pitchman for the Sam Adams brand, was in the studio the day of the contest. (The company didn't return a call seeking comment).

One of the risky sex landmarks was St. Patrick's Cathedral.

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Big mistake. Never disrespect someone's religion.

Sure enough, one of the competing couples, plus a producer who was sent along as a "spotter," were arrested. The resulting outrage from the Catholic League and FCC investigation led Viacom (VIA.B: Research, Estimates), which owns the radio station that Opie and Anthony worked at through its Infinity Broadcasting unit, to cancel the show and fire the jockeys.

It was obvious from their antics that Opie and Anthony would go too far someday. Heck, this is the third time they did this sort of contest.

Viacom, however, was oblivious to this inevitability. It was willing to take the money the show made, but not willing to look over its shoulder and look for trouble BEFORE it happened. At best, it was lazy and, at worst, negligent. Viacom wouldn't comment beyond its official statement on the matter.

Sure, the station manager and producer are getting punished too. But the corporate chieftains, who ultimately made the firing decision, should be held accountable too. At the very least, the corporation should donate some part of the profits it made off the show to the church it offended.

Too much corporate oversight would have spoiled the show? I don't think so. Opie and Anthony did pretty responsible and sensitive radio last September. They are capable.

That's not to say it wouldn't be hard to manage them. The day after the "Sex for Sam" contest, they were ridiculing the corporate lawyers and management on the air.

Nevertheless, if you are going to profit off these guys, you should be keeping an eye on them too. This after-the-fact punishment is disingenuous.  

Allen Wastler is Managing Editor of CNN/Money and a correspondent for CNNfn. He can be emailed here.