Gene Whitt wrote:
Jeff,
The 'local' ATC station is responsible for airborne traffic and must
provide 'standard' separation but ACTUAL avoidance is always the first
responsibility of the pilot. They may give advisories and often do but it
is only required when conditions permit.

You're all mixed up here. You are mixing all the separation
requirements and throwing them in to one pot. When you say standard
separation to a controller that always means 1000 or 3 miles(5 miles for
a center controller). At a class D tower the controller is required to
provide IFR separation to IFR aircraft. Usually this is done by issuing
the headings given to them by the approach control that gave the IFR
release. If any aircraft is VFR there is no separation standard. If
they miss you're golden. Traffic advisories are required per the .65.


Once traffic has been pointed out to you and you acknowledge having the
traffic in sight, ATC does not need to advise you ever again.

ATC may be required to tell you to maintain visual separation. Depends
on if you're IFr or VFR and the type of airspace.