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Snapcaster mage is a more powerful card than most of the modern banned list.

The only reason it is not banned is because its not part of a combo deck, and because it is a creature.

Well, we all know DCI just picks cards out of a hat and slams the ban hammer on them. I see where MM would be a problem though, I just don't see where dread return is an issue especially with all the grave hate now. Anyways I remember when I was working on hulk/flash the same week flash got banned and literally I was like WTF instead of banning the broken card you ban the card that nobody EVER played with, but yeah luckily I was able to sell the flashes back as much as I bought them for. I dunno though guys this was one reason I left magic in the first place next to job issues and the shop I went to shutting down, plus all my friends hated playing against dirty kitty, sunny side up, trainwreck, T1.5 vial gobbos, scepter/chant, Aluren, etc... =\

My problem with the modern banlist wasnt the cards they banned, but the reasons given for their banning. Like in the article banning mental mistep, they basically said it stops t1 aggro plays like wild nacatl that win aggro players the game. At the time Nacatl was not banned. I heard that and it felt like they basically were saying we want an aggro deck in every top 8. and thats not how magic is supposed to go. The players and their choices should decide that, not the Company with their banlists. Same with Affinity lands. Affinity is a very easily beaten deck, if you have the forsight to prepare for it. If you ignore it, you will get blown out. Thats on the players. By banning lands, you basically say to players, you dont need to worry about fastest affinity, just get ready for fast affinity. which isnt so bad. Not complaining about robots(my modern deck) mind you, just an example.

You realize Citadel is safe because it doesn't produce colored mana?  If you unbanned the 5 that actually can give you colored mana, you'd get a return of Affinity, a deck that caused people to leave the game in droves.

Ponder AND Preordain might give combo too much on an edge.  I'd probably leave one of them banned.  Ponder would probably still be banned due to it's "Shuffle" clause, which can slow games down if done frequently.

Misstep should always be banned.  Aggro would play it MD just to answer other Missteps.

Glimpse is still a huge CA enabler.

As far as Dredge goes, there still are Bloodghast s around.  With Fetchlands it'd be really easy to mill 3 Bloodghasts into the yard with some Bridge from Belows, play a Fetch, landfall in the Bloodghasts, sac them to Dread Return for say Flame-Kin Zealot , then with that on the stack, crack the fetch to get all those back into play before Zealot makes it's appearance.  With 2 Bridges that's 10 3 power creatures (thanks to Zealot) suddenly in play.

Punishing Fire with Grove of the Burnwillows equates to unlimited burn.  Any deck with Red would play both as 4-ofs, because what Red deck doesn't want to always have removal?  I would totally rock out with a Pyromancer's Swath combo deck built around Fire + Grove.  3 mana, 4 damage to anything every turn without fail seems good.

JtMS is still too strong.  He's just too much on his own, him in any Blue deck just makes the deck better.  Who doesn't want a free Brainstorm every turn?  Of have the option to Unsummon the other guys bomb?  Or to manipulate the top of the other players library?  AND he can be a win condition?

I don't like playing against Thopter Foundry + Sword of the Meek.  1 mana for 1 life and a 2/3 flyer is pretty rediculous, once the combo's online, you just play Draw, Go and make a bunch of token every turn and just burry people in CA.  Foundry makes them go in Blue so they already have the control they need, they can go Black for more control and use Dimir Infiltrator as a tutor for their pieces.

I'm pretty sure banning Grapeshot makes storm mostly unviable.  To risky to try to go off with Ignite Memories and Dragonstorm would likey be just too slow.

Wizards really needs to print some good control spells to help keep combo in check.  FoW does this in Legacy/Vintage.  Maybe some kind of soft-counter equavalent?  Pitch a Blue card, pay 1 life, counter target spell unless it's controler pays .  Or a modified version of Disrupting Shoal , with X being how many Blue mana symbols are in the exiled card's casting cost.  But that would be rather hard to write simply.

If I were to revise my original banned list, I would probably now go with:

Plating
Skullclamp
Hypergenesis
Dread Return
Glimmerpost (to allow Cloudpost to come off)
Grapeshot
Dark Depths
Blazing Shoal

Elves probably aren't even that broken, just run sweepers like Pyroclasm. Stoneforge - creature or artifact removal. Remember, the only goal here is to prevent turn 3 wins. Everything else is irrelevant.

I wish they could just up the life totals up to 30, but alas