We Don't Need No Stinkin' Fourth Amendment

This has not been a good time for those who care about Constitutional rights. In the latest twist, the RIAA wants the power to literally act as the Copyright Police:

The Recording Industry Assn. of America, in effect, wants to give law enforcement officials the power to enter manufacturing plants without notice or court orders to check that discs are legitimate and carry legally required identification marks.

The proposal by state Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima) is raising questions among U.S. constitutional law scholars as it quietly moves through the Legislature.

"I can understand why this makes people nervous," said Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Law School of Los Angeles. "We have the 4th Amendment that generally requires probable cause [for a search]. This is a huge exception."

Sorry, but I'm having trouble seeing where. At any rate, there may be a more basic reason for pushing this bill:

Net sales of CDs fell 82% in the last decade, while the number of copies shipped dropped 76%, according to the RIAA. Sales and rentals of movie discs last year declined 19% from a peak of $20.2 billion in 2006, according to the Digital Entertainment Group, an industry-funded advocacy group.

To be sure, other factors have caused sales to fall. In recent years, for instance, music downloads and video streaming have taken the biggest bite out of disc sales. But piracy continues to cause financial losses.

Naturally, it doesn't seem to occur to the RIAA that they might be behind the times. Dinosaurs can't contemplate their own demise, after all.