The first link is about scanning, storing, and making available entire books. The last is about the caching ability.
The second one includes some great information, but if you read about the specific cases (starting on page 6) you can see it is still very much up for debate. Actually it seems that the courts have ruled in Google's favor almost every time, and most of these are for caching and not indexing.
You are right that search engines have made some advances in the courts in recent years, but the bases for their wins are thin and not the same in all countries. Barring legal action a site can block Google's known IPs entirely, forcing a search engine to either give up or use subterfuges that are probably not practical for a large public company to use.
If a site really really wants to block a particular engine run by a for-profit company, or make it impractical (either legally or technically) they can.
The second one includes some great information, but if you read about the specific cases (starting on page 6) you can see it is still very much up for debate. Actually it seems that the courts have ruled in Google's favor almost every time, and most of these are for caching and not indexing.