Regarding table literals, some products support using
VALUES (1, 'a'), (2, 'b'), ...
as a table constructor in general, not just in INSERT, and looking at SQL:92, SQL:99, and SQL:2003 it looks to me like this should be standard SQL. Derived tables, aka subqueries, exist in SQL:92 at least as well, so whether or not that is considered recent depends on how you look at it, I think.
I am not trying to defend SQL with this, and all in all this does not take away from the points you raised, but the above were something that stood out.
as a table constructor in general, not just in INSERT, and looking at SQL:92, SQL:99, and SQL:2003 it looks to me like this should be standard SQL. Derived tables, aka subqueries, exist in SQL:92 at least as well, so whether or not that is considered recent depends on how you look at it, I think.
I am not trying to defend SQL with this, and all in all this does not take away from the points you raised, but the above were something that stood out.