I'm sure I'm not saying anything that already hasn't been said before, since I didn't have time to read the entire thread.
But I'd say no, absoltueltely not. Not in the modern sense of "balance" anyway.
Balance is a contemporaneous preoccupation of modern, technologically-obsessed Geeks, but it was not of the Nerds who originally designed and played the game.
The earlier editions of the game were not concurred with "technical matters" nearly as intently as with the game being interesting and heroic. (It's sort of analogous to the difference between the type of science necessary to send a man to the moon for the very first time, versus the type of science necessary to safely complete the 300th Shuttle mission in LEO.)
Ask yourself this question, go back and look at those character "classes" in earlier editions and ask yourself objectively if they seem balanced to you at all, say, compared to 3E, 4E or other modern, commonly accepted ideas and ideals of RPG balance?
Of course they weren't, and neither was the game itself, as a whole.
That's because earlier editions of the game were not the work-result of a committee of Geeks, but of a small group of Nerds. And often of individual Nerds.
The Geek's first preoccupations in design (in practically any kind of design) are process and outcome (and how do you rigidly and purposely control these aspects of function in design, or put another way, how do you discourage the unforeseen and unplanned during operations?), the Nerd's first priorities are flexibility and innovation (and how do you encourage, rather than discourage, these functional aspects of design during actual operations, or put another way, how do you encourage innovation during ordinary operations?).
And that's a totally different set of priorities and outlook upon the world.
It's the difference between Corporate Strategy (which I have nothing against, as it is often a valuable exercise and method of operation) and Individual Genius (which is far les concerned with refinement and process, and far more interested in creativity and originality).
Of course to be absolutely accurate in discussing these emitters one would have to develop exact an exact definition for the term Balance, and that definition would have to both define Balance generally speaking, and allow for any variation or alteration in actual meaning over the passage of time, and due to modifications in use..
Something that could be precisely developed in say, an academic or theoretical paper, but I doubt you're gonna see much agreement on over the public internet.
