[nwienert]

How does that explain Julia[0]/Node.js? Both within 1-2x speed of C, I think static has less to do with it than you think.

[0] http://julialang.org/

[hythloday]

You pretty much have to enforce static type invariants (e.g. "this variable will never be other than an int") to JIT stuff performantly. I don't think that's a point against the GP's argument at all.