What experience? I know quite a few people (not the HN crowd) who are reasonably smart, but give them a newspaper editorial by itself and they'll be lost. Not 96% of people I know, but a decent amount.
Take, for instance, today's editorial in the Telegraph (of Calcutta):
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:qrMr6hx...
I'm pretty lost trying to read that. If I didn't keep up with US politics I'd be equally lost trying to read the New York Times.