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There are smaller denominations. You can have .00000001 bitcoins, for example (it's 8 decimal places = 1 satoshi right?)

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Yes. More decimal places can also be added later on.

If we really get to the point where 1BTC = USD100,000, I could see the decimal point shifting and rebase (e.g. 1BTC now = 100,000 new BTC)

I hear a lot of people talking about the need to shift decimal points, but never really understood -- what's the benefit of this over just using SI prefixes? To me, it's clear how 1mBTC relates to 1BTC and 1µBTC.

I think people underestimate consumers. Before Decimal Day (1971), 1 British pound was worth 20 shillings, and 1 shilling was 12 pence[1]. As confusing as it seems to me, apparently that worked for awhile. Likewise, I think consumers could deal with SI prefixes in a decimal system (rather than needing to redefine how much 1 BTC is).

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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_Day

There is no benefit, it's just a technical possibility.

The other possibility is that the eventual client app on your smartphone just works in femtoBTC and handles the UI however people choose {BTC, satoshis, femtoBTC, USD, CNY, whatever}.

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