The Khmer Rouge/Red Cambodia was an out-of-control regime terrorizing and murdering its own people for years.

I would have hoped that the only similarity between the Khmer Rouge and Baton Rouge/Red Stick, would be the word “rouge”/red rather than deadly abuse of power. We don’t need nor merit police using excessive force with red sticks, blue sticks, guns, fists, tasers, nor anything else.

It is not enough for those into local, state and national government in the United States to say that police abuse here is a far cry from abuse by the Khmer Rouge. We should be able to say that police abuse is nearly non-existent.

However, police abuse is part and parcel of our overgrown criminal justice system that is too big to be able only to hire, train, supervise, pay, reward, and promote the best people for the job, and not to hire those who have no business being police. Our criminal justice system will remain overgrown so long as we have an overgrown national security state and excessive war on terror that repeatedly violates our rights and worse here and abroad; and so long as we do not yet legalize marijuana, prostitution, and gambling; heavily decriminalize all other drugs; eliminate mandatory minimum sentencing; eliminate the death penalty; and eliminate per se DWI guilt rules based on blood alcohol threshold levels.

What I know so far about the Baton Rouge police killing (see also here) includes that police already had caught suspect Alton Sterling, but shot him dead anyway.

What I know so far about the St. Anthony, Minnesota, police killing includes that police fatally shot Philando Castile after apparently a minor traffic stop, after Mr. Castile told police he had a firearm, for which he purportedly had a license to carry.

Whether or not racial considerations motivated the shooting police, both fatal police shooting victims are black, and the shooting police are white.

Often in the face of such terrible tragedy, I offer my prayers. I do that here, but prayers are not enough. Enough is enough.