Well stated. This simple fact seems to go over the head of most of society and, amazingly, most on this freedom loving forum.
What really upsets me is when I hear a Senator or a Congressman (or the RIAA) explain how a new law they want passed is intended to "send a message". If it is the law then it is the law. If you are not willing to arrest all the offendors, charge them with a crime and prosecute them then you have bad law. (I will avoid getting into the drug laws here since we are focused on the P2P-RIAA issue but the principle is very much the same.)
And that is why "morality crimes" need to be evaluated from a utilitarian rather than "righteous" position. The law must work with society. You can't ramrod a new way of looking at things down society's throat through the law. The fact that we still have so many drug offenders, many of whom are good productive citizens, would have been an argument against drug prohibition for most drug warriors if they possessed common sense.
Within 100-200 years Capitalism and Socialism as we know them now will probably be dead thanks to scientific advancement. Very advanced replication technologies will make it child's play to build new physical products. My hunch is that "American Capitalism" will evolve into a "hacker culture" where people can safely explore many opportunities that are too risky today because of the expense of production. Property rights will become almost a God-given absolute because you'll need a more effective mechanism than we have now to protect those who hack away and produce.
In short, things will only get harder for the reactionary elements of both the left and the right to deal with. I am beginning to see that the new political paradigm of "Stasisists" versus "Dynamists" is far more accurate than "Left versus Right." You know you have a paradigm shift when conservatives are en masse calling for a reevaluation of corporate (all kinds of corporate entities) rights (in this case on copyright) and when on many issues now conservatives and libertarians are finding common ground with moderates on the left.
I think one of the defining moments for this part of the 21st century in America will be the emerging left-right coallition opposed to the War on Terrorism's excesses like the USA PATRIOT Act. The future I see for America in the long run is four main political factions:
All forms of political liberals from the left and right and all forms of authoritarians will gravitate into a new set of opposing coallitions. We're already seeing this with the divide between those on each side that think that "piracy" is bad and those who think it's a symptom of a corrupt legal system, legislature and uncompetitive businesses. On that note, Reason is a great publication as its viewpoint is typically liber(al || tarian) capitalist, but sometimes socialistic too. It can be quite insightful to note the differences between state and libertarian socialists.