[FranzVonSuppe]

I don't understand how you can say Java, C++, and Ruby in the same breath. They are not at all alike. Also what optimizations are available to C which are not in C++? C++ is (almost) a strict superset of C.

[Argorak]

Just because C++ is a superset of C doesn't mean that all C++ features are in a way comparable to C (in compiling and at runtime).

[lmm]

Restrict pointers in C let you write code that's faster than the C++ equivalent for functions that copy a lot of memory.