That's what he's saying, and he's right. When was the last time you actually played an older CoD, man? Just for reference, I still play CoD4 and WaW and I think you're misremembering.
CoD4 is extremely similar to MW2! Before I re-bought it about a year ago, I had memories like yours about how weapons were harder to use, people were harder to kill and it was harder to be a cheap bastard, but I was really surprised when I booted it back up again... I think only 2-3 guns have idle sway, and when they do sway, it's fake sway (gun moves, red dot stays in place). Most guns have zero recoil, or fake recoil (same as the sway). It plays
just like MW2, just without massive amounts of shitty tactics or kits.
(One of these days, I'm gonna succeed at tricking a quickscoping hater to go buy CoD4... That'll be hilarious.

)