I think the author was referring to programmability as in language extensibility. So the "geniuses" he references would be C++ template metaprogramming wizards. I don't think he was claiming that statically typed languages require you to be a genius to use.
Yeah, well, I actually meant both. One can't claim C++ is an "easy language" no matter what you are doing with it. And let's face it, most languages that are considered "easy to use" are dynamically typed. So yes, I do think it's a common opinion. And yes there are surely exceptions you can find :)
