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I remember coming up a book one time(maybe reviewed by Razib Khan) that made this exact point that much of Europe's progress came from it's internal conflict but I have not been able to find it again... does anyone have a clue what I may be thinking of?

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You might be thinking of "Guns, Germs, and Steel"

That would be it (by Jared Diamond).

An interesting followup from another angle is "Why nations fail" by Acemoglu and Robinson.

Note that GGS is not actually held in high regard by academic historians. Its pop history.

That's really not true.

Do you have any specific arguments against it? Is it your view, for instance, that non-euasian continents could have achieved the power of eurasia, in spite of their lack of suitable plants and animals, and if so, what accounts for what actually happened?

This just comes with close personal association with a whole bunch of history PhDs. I myself am not an expert on the topic, but they talk about this book the way that psychologists talk about Gladwell. If you want an example of respected history that follows this sort of geographic history model you should read Braudel.

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