really its the old Ian Paisley/Gerry Adams conundrum, isn't it. They're both Irishmen. They both have much more in common than they have with Englishmen.

That's how it is with folk music. i went into folk music. Was dismayed by the ways the leaders of the sect took the music. But really I had for more in common with the folksingers i disagreed with than people who had never been inside a folk club.

Mudcat is a place where people with divergent opimions about folk music can meet and discuss.   But the divergence is still there.