Refute this again!

There is a modern plot to destroy a good word, the word “refuteâ€?.

I have previously challenged the solecism which equates “refuteâ€? and “rejectâ€?. The latest culprit is Bertie Ahern, as reported HERE in the Irish Times.

He said:

I refute in the strongest terms the suggestion that a passport application being returned through the offices of a TD, in this case Bertie Ahern, signifies some special relationship is an absolute fallacy.”

Ignore the fact he was referring to himself in the third person.

Ignore the fact that the sentence does not make grammatical sense.

We know what he meant; he meant he “rejectedâ€? something: he certainly did not refute it.

Dictionary.com says of “refute”:

refute
1. to prove to be false or erroneous, as an opinion or charge.
2. to prove (a person) to be in error.