To begin with, I didn't say I agreed or disagreed with him. I was merely pointing out, what to me, was the obvious purpose of the video which was to show that a shotgun with buckshot is just as, or more deadly than the AR-15.
Having said that, any idiot knows that a shotgun would have been useless in the Vegas shooting. However, according to the Wikipedia article that lists the twenty deadliest mass shootings in the U.S., the only one that was perpetrated from a distance like the Vegas shooting was the University of Texas Tower shooting in 1966. Of the other nineteen shootings, only three were perpetrated out of doors. All the others were close quarters shootings with most of them taking place inside buildings. Also, of the three that were perpetrated out of doors, one - the Camden shooting of 1949 - was committed solely with a handgun that achieved the same body count as one of the other outdoor shootings - the Wilkes-Barre, PA shooting in 1982 - in which a semi-auto rifle was used.
In addition to all this, of the total twenty deadliest shootings, handguns were solely used in eight of them with the worst one being the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007 with a body count of 32. That's almost twice the number that Cruz killed with a semi-auto rifle.
Try again.
The AR15 is better suited for killing large amounts of people in as short a time as possible in a wider range of environments than pistols or shotguns. The military determined that, and I trust their judgement.
You'll have to provide me with a source or a link for that. Not that I doubt it, but just so I can see what the overall conclusion is.
But anyway, first of all, the military doesn't use the AR-15. Secondly, military soldiers are trained to use these weapons (M16s) with as much skill as possible. Thirdly, most military combat takes place in the open so pistols and shotguns are useless in these environments and it would be silly to compare the two. Fourthly, an M16 may serve the purpose in close quarters combat but soldiers have other people shooting back. A mass shooter does not.
Also, unlike a soldier, a mass shooter can always choose his battleground. This is precisely why they choose schools, restaurants and offices to get the maximum kill effect. And, again, given that handguns were used in some of the worst shootings, it's all pretty much academic.
What concerns myself and a lot of gun owners about all this is that we all know that if they ban semi-autos, it won't stop there. That would be the wedge to open the door and set a precedent to justify future bans. No one on this side of the gun debate aisle is fooled for one minute by conciliatory and concessionary rhetoric. We know that ultimately they want to ban firearms altogether.