You're still wrong. That mentality allows wars to happen, it doesn't cause them. Necessary and sufficient conditions are very different beasts, my friend.

Oh, I was careful to not define "win", on purpose.

I disagree. There have been lots of states that DEEPLY disagree about ideology but didn't escalate to war. Ideology is an excuse for war, not a cause of it.

Wars pretty much happen because of scarcity of resources and imbalance of information. Both sides think they can win (even factoring in the cost of war) and both sides can't have the resources. Structuring languages and governments can make more slightly less likely, but not significantly so.

You can't fix the imbalance of information as no society will believe a simulation all the time, especially of war, which depends on all sorts of human factors. The only way out, really, is to have unlimited resources. That is actually the main thesis implied by the push for globalization: That through capitalism, we can have a non-zero sum game (drastically increase available resources to all nations) and avert real war. And it seems to work -- but it leads to the (reasonable) criticism of the anti-globalists: that there is still a finite amount of resources and sooner or later capitalist technological innovation won't be able to extend them any further.

Which leads to the basic final disconnect: Are you fundamentally optimistic about technology or pessimistic? If you're an optimist, we've already solved the long term problems that create world wars, and the last two were simply a painful transition period. If you're a pessimist, we've only delayed the inevitable and they were merely a preview of coming attractions -- which increased resource use is hastening.

I think this is an avenue for research. Perhaps, some day, someone will devise some sort of "under-sea" or possibly "sub-marine" waterproof telegraphic cable in order to electrgraphically connect two stationary points across a body of open water. I'd imagine you'd have to customize some sort of cable-laying vessel as well. Once this breakthough is achieved, we'll be able to transmit data from a ship to shore.

Faster first, then light travel!

Great, you've invented the fat-ray. Now America will simply pay people in the third world to have American fat redistributed overseas. Think e-waste was bad for the third world? Watch out for f-waste.

Wow, 6.2 Billion. That's a damn big chunk of change to spend and get nothing to show for it. I'm pretty sure Elon Musk could build a permanent manned moon base for 6.2 billion, and Microsoft, apparently can't even sell an ad. Of course, this is emblematic of Microsoft's lost decade (the years since Bill became a philanthropist): Microsoft decides a field is going to be hot, buys a reasonable player, mangles it, and then six months later shuts it down as a "failure". They have become like a child with ADHD -- abandoning things as soon as the next shiny object passes into view. It's sad, because they seem to be unable to learn from their experiences.

We haven't "Lost the ability" -- we simply don't have factories set up to manufacture that particular rocket. The "orbital propellant depot" concept -- made viable by the "new space" companies and their radically cheaper rockets has been much denigrated by the entrenched space lobby in congress, but the simple fact is, we now have experience in assembling modular craft in orbit (ISS), and thanks to modern computers and materials, spacecraft can be appreciable lighter. Plus, thanks to those same technologies (and better lunar surveying done in the last few years), we can robotically pre-land much of the equipment needed to mount a lunar expedition. Sure, the mission profile would look different, and building the hardware to land on and return from the moon would still cost billions, but the Falcon Heavy, which is really just a falcon 9 modified, will be ready within the next few years. With a green light today and consistent funding, we could easily have a permanent lunar presence by the end of the decade. I would guess the total cost would be less than ten billion dollars, if we were able to keep the government pork under control.

Someone else said this, but it bears repeating: Columbus isn't important because he was the first person to discover the new world, he's important because he was the last. After his voyage, its existence became widely known public knowledge.
TL;DR: Columbus was the Apple of explorers.

Protons.

Lab made diamonds are cheaper to create than gem grade consumer diamonds. I'm no expert, but I thought that industrial grade diamond (e.g. tiny ones, which this would DEFINITELY USE) was really cheap by virtue of being pretty abundant.

Given that it's a software licensing office, I wouldn't be surprised if a huge amount of income actually does pass through there. What right does the state of Washington have to make claims on revenue outside their jurisdiction?

As someone who has physically visited Microsoft's "Nevada Tax Dodge", I can tell you that they have hundreds of people employed across three office buildings, doing real work. Here's a street view: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=microsoft+licensing,+GP&hl=en&ll=39.466978,-119.777091&spn=0.014196,0.027874&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&hq=microsoft+licensing,+GP&radius=15000&t=m&z=16&layer=c&cbll=39.465765,-119.778911&panoid=SCavTRVJLjF335ijk_l6-w&cbp=12,0,,0,0 The white buildings to the left and right of the frame are wholly occupied by MS while the brown building in the center has one whole floor occupied by MS employees. Declaring that MS has no right to do business in states where taxes are lower is...well, disgusting.