Issues of mental illness, which our culture struggles with handling, continue to create problems for those who don't understand or aren't touched by those with mental illness and/or disabilities. Those who battle depression, mood disorders, autism, bipolar, schizophrenia, and other maladies often seek treatment or are led to treatment by those around them, and great success can be found in many households.

The social stigma that surrounds mental illness is fairly severe, often undeserved. Ted Cruz, however, seemingly can't stop from making the link, informing his crowd that we should "go after" the mentally ill.

But how, exactly, would this have solved the problem in Charleston? Ted Cruz provides no answers - largely because there are none, and any answer that would involve a government so invasive that it would follow up on all individuals care would scare the daylights out of most small-government Republicans.

Conspiracy theories, such as these preferred by Ted Cruz, are reliant on bad guys, and Ted Cruz has to have many of them. There are Democrats who want to regulate guns, he says. Mentally ill people we haven't gone after. Repeat felons and criminals.

None of these are the case in Charleston. While he was out on bond on a petty drug charge, his prior brushes with the law involved a trespassing charge.

Tighter controls on those with non-violent criminal records seem unlikely to match Ted Cruz view of gun control.

However, his attack on those with mental illnesses gives him a chance to advocate for more funds and resources for programs to help those with mental illness and disabilities. NAMI reports that the house and senate are both working on bills to provide more funding and research to mental illness and disabilities, as well as clinic resources. We will have to see if Ted Cruz will support this effort.

In the meantime, someone might need to point out to Ted Cruz that his repeated use of conspiracy theories and paranoia mean he himself may be teetering on paranoia, a mental illness which can cause individuals to be paranoid about others always out to get them or those around them.

People with mental disabilities are not at fault, and a government that "goes after" them is a real conspiracy. I don't think anyone in this country, right or left, really wants.