So when a dead body is buried, it is working? I guess if they can vote democrat, why not.
You weren't paying attention. Ritual=work. Baptism=ritual. Therefore, baptism=work. Trusting for your involvement in a ritual (baptism or otherwise) to save you is what is commonly called "salvation by works," and is unbiblical.
Once again, the work that saves in baptism was done on the cross. I keep pointing out that no one believes dunking itself is intrinsically salvific.
Like I said, you make baptism the instrumental cause of salvation, a place that the Bible gives to faith (Eph. 2:8,9).
By the way, "baptism" is a religious weasel-word, the more correct word is immersion or dunking. By using "baptism" rather than "immersion", all sorts of chicanery can be accomplished because it isolates the ritual from everyday life. "Baptism" has become something with infinitely variable definition. For example, you claim that most of the places "baptism" is used, it is the baptism of the Holy Spirit. When Paul penned the Greek word for immersion, it was plain to see that he was talking about water immersion because that is the understood context of immersion in everyday life. That is why the bible explicitly says "baptism (immersion) of the Holy Spirit", because the immersion is in a different medium than would be otherwise assumed.
Several points here:
1) "baptizo" does not translate properly as "immerse". The early (pre-Vulgate, second-century A.D.) Latin translation, the Itala, does not translate "baptizo" as "immergo" (the Latin word for immersion), but leaves it as "baptizo". Not only that, but in several places in the New Testament, the word "baptizo" cannot be translated as "immerse", as in Mark 7:4, "And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not." Likewise in Luke 11:38, "And when the Pharisee saw it, he marveled that he had not first washed before dinner."
2) I nowhere claimed that the majority of places where the word "baptism" occurs, it refers to the baptism of the Holy Spirit--only that it is not incontrovertibly used to refer to water baptism in the places I cited. What I did say is that in the passages I cited that give the significance of baptism, they do not refer to the significance of water baptism itself, but instead to what water baptism itself is supposed to symbolize: the baptism of the Spirit.
3) It should also be pointed out that Peter equates the "baptism of the Spirit" with Joel's prophecy, "In the last days, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh." It is difficult to immerse someone by pouring liquid on them, since immersion necessarily implies completely covering the subject all at once, i.e., dipping.
Repeating it endlessly does not make it so. A funeral is a ritual, but the body being buried does not work. A burial is a ritual, but the corpse does not work. A baptism is a ritual, but the person being baptized does no work.
The idea behind salvation by works is that you can "pay up" your debt of sin to God. That is what the Jews of the first century thought they could do. That is what some tried to teach the early Christians.
But we know no matter what you do, you can't atone for your own sin. No one who believes baptism is essential believes that it earns their salvation. To earn something, you have to do the work required. The work required for salvation was done on the cross, and no matter how many times you accuse baptizers otherwise that remains the case.
only that it is not incontrovertibly used to refer to water baptism in the places I cited
The bible does not entertain sophists and those who approach it with a mind to distort. Washing, immersion, dunking, dipping all occur in water typically, and if you want someone to draw the conclusion some other media is involved you have to specify it. When Inspiration wants to refer us the the baptism of the Spirit, that is what is cited.