Forbes has just put Jennifer Lopez on top of their Celebrity 100 List, calling her the most powerful celebrity in the business with $52 million earned last year along with total pop culture domination. I don’t dispute it. American Idol is the best decision she’s ever made. The way she managed her career after that decision, with the music and the marketing and the branding, straight up, it was a clinic.

So of course she wants to quit Idol now.

It’s been 2 seasons. Us Weekly reports that with her job(s), and the tour, and her kids and, um, her boyfriend, it’s too much for her to handle right now. And I believe Us. I believe Us because I know they have it in really tight with JLo’s people after getting f-cked over last year with the separation announcement. This source is solid. She’s either really done with the show then or...

She just heard about Britney’s $15 million score and wants some of that too.

After the year she’s had, who else but JLo could defend against Britney and X Factor? Idol boss Nigel Lythgoe has already put it out there, after intense speculation yesterday that JLo’s on her way out, that he wants her back.  Very badly. I mean, at this point half the negotiating is done already. All she has to say is “match” or “more”. And there it is - a pay rise from the reported $12 million she already makes for, let’s face it, the role that secured most of her fanbase. Jennifer Lopez has never been more famous than she is right now. And it’s because American Idol takes it to the masses several times a week. The show does the work FOR her.

Which is another consideration before her departure.

If she leaves, will they follow?

Television is easy fame. They can support you without leaving the house. Without getting up off the couch. Without having to figure out how to click and download sh-t off the Internet. Television, for all its oldfashioned-ness, is what gets them to Kohl’s, where her fashion line is sold, and to the drugstore, so that they can buy her razors and her fragrances. They’re the ones who’ll embrace her when her 4th marriage falls apart.

So it might not be so easy being #1 on the Forbes list if she goes back out there, without the weekly Idol support system. But then there’s Casper in her ear, you know?

Baby, you are so much more than Idol. You make Idol. Let’s do our own thing. Let’s start our own production company together. Let’s take our love on the road. Let’s not be limited. We have no limits, baby. Our love can’t be limited.

Attached - JLo at the Idol studio yesterday.