Their kind of conservatism

Charades:

Boy Working

Yes. Everyone who guessed, guessed correctly. And now to the main event.

Just recently, to further promote his forthcoming Dante book, our hard-sniffing Working Boy availed himself of an interview with  "philosopher James K.A. Smith" (Is philosopher a professional designation? If not, can anyone be one? If so, how does one rank Smith relative to philosopher Charlie Brown or philosopher Pogo?).


Naturally, such favors must be repaid, head to tail, and so this tongue bath urging readers to subscribe to Smith's Comment magazine entitled Our Kind of Conservatism.

Here's what we need to figure out, though. In the comments under Smith's article Redeeming Conservatism, a commenter named John Tiemstra puts us on this notice:

OK, just as long as we understand that the real conservatives are people who favor market-based reforms, like cap and trade, Obamacare, and Dodd-Frank. Most so-called conservatives these days are not conservative at all, but radical libertarians.

Whoa, really? Forgive me, but that sounds more like the Pelosi-Obama-Reid wing of conservatism to me.

And no "Nuh-huh, nooooooooo, no way, Dude!" from philosopher James K. A. Smith.

Is there a nuanced mystery to this redeemed conservatism too complex for my dense and primitive monkey noggin? If not, where am I going astray from real conservatism? I will say Smith appears to me to be successfully "offer[ing] a posture".

(philosopher and noted poultry critic Keith M. Ionlyhaveonemiddleinitial H.)