Yes. It also has all the original conversation below the posts restored. The theme doesnt matter that much to me because I can control the display of a page client side, using something like Mercury or Dark Reader etc. In fact, I quite like the lack of a theme, leaving it entirely up to me. (Not that your theme in any way impedes that same freedom.)
I'm not sure I follow. Is the value add you bring to his blog the theming?
I ask because, the curated index you offer could just link back to the original posts.
Given everything else being equal, I would prefer to read the original source over a mirror. I then dont have to verify it is an accurate representation, and they dont have to be kept in sync if things change on the source end. Maybe a separate clickable link at the end of each line that takes you to the original post would be helpful. (orig) A link blog / pure index model would also run less afoul of any sort of copyright issue, if you wanted to extend this concept to other blogs. I would personally encourage this, shifting to a more generalized linkblog that links outward to other sscesque writing. It makes your offering more unique than a theme and index.