There are one or two British and Irish folk singers who are unashamedly left-wing and that's always fine by me, but what I don't like is a song that's too directly polemical. I think that's a misjudgement occasionally made. A folk singer is a talented musician but that doesn't necessarily earn him a public platform from which to beat us about our heads with his personal politics. I feel the same about army generals pontificating on the telly about defence policy or Prince BigEars regaling us with his wacky notions about architecture or homeopathy. What I love so much about Woody Guthrie and his songs is that he could communicate a simple message far more powerfully via a story or a description of people - his people - than by pushing a political standpoint down our throats. That's true art in my book.