Your papers, please...

Without the protections of the 4th Amendment, what distinguishes us from other totalitarian regimes?

Baltimore native Chris Bilal was walking through his adopted Brooklyn neighborhood when he was stopped by a police officer. The NYPD officer peppered the 24-year-old with questions about where he lived, requested Bilal’s ID and rummaged through his bag.
“I was coming home from the Laundromat and I was stopped by the police officer. Asking me, ‘Let me see your ID. ‘Where are you from?’  ‘Do you live around here?’ ”
The officer then proceeded to rummage through Bilal’s bag of freshly cleaned and folded laundry to see if he was carrying anything illegal. The search produced nothing, and the officer sent Bilal on his way.
“They were searching for drugs. The funny thing was that it was a mesh laundry bag. I’m not sure what I could hide,” Bilal said.

The ability of 'law enforcement' to stop anyone, anytime, anywhere, for any reason is the very definition of a police state.  New York City's been headed that way for some time.  Sadly, the rest of the country isn't all that far behind.