The Rights We Loosing

A few moments ago, I came across a family from another state who had just parked in a legal spot on my block. In their state one does not need a front licence plate, so to accommodate NY ( which they did not have to do by law ) the fellow put his extra plate on the dash board.
A traffic enforcement officer told him that she was going to give him a ticket, that it would have been better not to have it there at all. He said, "I'll just move it to the glove compartment." She told him she would ticket him anyway, even though she had not yet done so. When she told him the amount of the ticket he was stunned. I, from a respectful distance, began to photograph the exchange. She covered her face with her hat and said, "Please don't take my photograph... " then, "I am told you that you can't so you can't." I politely replied that she was in public. She said that it was not legal to photograph the police, and I told her that under the constitution of the United States, it was. She then, still covering her face walked away, so the fellow was saved the ticket. However, this fits with on going actions against citizens in New York City, where the police are telling folks on the streets that it is against the "Patriot Act" to photograph the police.
How long will this be an America we can recognize at all?