Hi Steve,
I was perusing some of our ArcGIS Pro threads when I ran across your post. Thanks for taking the time to mention your "wish-list"! Like Robert, I'm an Esri instructor and, as such, am generally not privvy to the when/why of decisions made on the development teams. That said, I wanted to address a potential solution to one of your suggestions:
Quote "A standard tool bar that is always up where we can add tools to and has some standard buttons like zoom".
Have you considered customizing the quick-access toolbar to create your own standard toolbar? In ArcGIS Pro you can right-click most any UI element and choose the option to "Add to Quick-Access Toolbar". This allows you to add tools for pan/zoom/identify (just add the Explore tool to the toolbar), etc. in a location that is accessible regardless of the tab in which you're working. See these screenshots for an example.
Image 1. Location of Quick-access toolbar
Image 2. Right-click Explore tool > Add to Quick Access Toolbar
Image 3. Quick-access toolbar now contains Explore tool
Here's a screenshot of the toolbar w/ the add basemap, add data, select by rectangle, Geoprocessing pane (toolbox + GP tool search in one), modelbuilder, convert from 2D to 3D, and share project package functionality added just as an example of a more robust toolbar.
Hope this helps!
Cheers,
Mike