I was about to touch on it, but there is a marked difference between power and authority. Do the people bandying these terms around know the difference?
As far as the rest is concerned, it's semantics. There was a retcon. I get what the "2=2" people are saying. I also get what the other side is saying. If we're going to be pedantic about what a retcon means, there isn't a debate, because there never was a classic MM to begin with. Of course, I define "classic" as pre-retcon. In short, for those of you expounding the effects of a retcon, it's basically LT vs a character that never existed, which means this debate is over for you guys. Let the rest of the people have it from their point of view.