Jim,
I have to disagree with you over the English language songs not being mostly ballads. They are. They are also 90% 'broadside ballads'.
All I have to do to verify this is glance around my bookshelves at the titles as you should do yours. Your other opinions I agree with completely.

Dick,
The quality of the song/ballad is irrelevant to your thread.
BUT for WIW I agree with you about Bert.

Curious JeffB
You only have to read some of Child's own comments, and he was being generous! No-one nowadays disputes the concoctions of Percy and Scott but some of the others are still contentious. We're working on it. The jury's still out!