Harvard conservatives in the Keyes/Kristol era were big fans of Leo Strauss. Aside from the Straussian elitism anyone who listens to Keyes for five minutes is aware of, Keyes also displays a Straussian concept of the social utility of religion and patriotism. That is what his comments about this editorial cartoon are all about.
At the time that Keyes and Kristol were at Harvard, nearly ALL serious, non anarcho-libertarian conservatives were Strauss fans, at least in part.
The ISI (Intercollegiate Studies Institute) funded summer seminars for young conservative intellectuals to learn from the leading conservative thinkers, and Strauss was just about the number one on the list of seminar leaders. There were numerous articles in National Review and Modern Age propounding Straussian concepts.
Your charges against Keyes amount to criticizing him for the year of his birth. Pretty silly.