Article submitted and clearly referee cannot understand basic premise-What to do?
I understand how you feel, but what you propose in solution 2 does not sound productive. I try to see (after the initial phase of being dissapointed and annoyed) the reviewer as a potential reader of that journal who is gracious enough to spent more time on your article than most readers will. Apparently, my article wasn't clear enough at a point, and that is something that needs to be fixed. It is easy to think something is too basic it needs no explaining, but there are a great many such basic facts; many more than anyone can remember... I suggest you take the same approach.