Well, I thought I'd post what I ended up doing. My friend Charlie who has a car repair shop came over and together we tried to get the CV joint/axle out but no luck. So rather than risk breaking a perfectly good transmission, I decided to just grease that CV joint in place and seal it back up. I think that "Axle Popper" tool would probably work (kinda like a ball joint separating tool) but it would have obviously put tremendous pressure on the axle shaft and could possibly break something. There's apparently something wrong with that retaining ring on the end of the axle shaft. I'll just leave that axle shaft in the transmission until the transmission needs rebuilding.

Obviously I'm reading through this ten years after the original post but it was informative and entertaining. I'm pretty angry at you for giving up before succeeding or breaking something though. That's not how I do things!