Earlier quoted context omitted.
>That is intrinsic to most tools that dare call themselves "source control". Bullshit. 'Merge' is one of the most complicated operations in every versioning system. I'm pretty confident svn is 'inconsistent'. Or is that too niche?
Merge is a tool. The issue is, can you reproduce source accurately, from a variety of starting points, and be sure you have some canonical thing (release x.y). Do I understand you right? This is not the expectation for a source control tool?
You can reproduce any repository state that you (or anyone else) have stored. You can do it simply, reliably, and quickly. That is not in doubt.
Merge is not a tool for reproducing a canonical state, it's a tool for combining two or more of them, an entirely different topic.
Any other straw men you'd like to hold up real fast?