You mean can't do overload resolution, run template specialization and selection, implicit conversions, and move constructor semantics all in your head at once?
Not sure what's the difference between read and understand here. And I would argue the language doesn't even have the biggest effect on whether code is easy to understand or not, some people have an incredible ability to structure code in an easy/impossible to understand way.
Also something close to every single language in the universe is going to argue that's one of its goals.
But you don't need to go too far to find something you can argue has such a goal:
- RAII: it's easier to read and write a function when it's not full of resource deallocation code.
- Exceptions: It's simpler to understand code when you move the error handling away.
- algorithms: simpler to read and write than your for loop.
- ...
It's such a vague goal that you can argue it about anything from any language.
But the impression it gives me is that C++ is not fulfilling the expressed requirements, and it is not currently moving in the right direction.
I read it as a quite strong critic of the current state of the language...