The Patriot Post® · Getting the Schock Out of Peoria

By age of 23, Aaron Schock (R-IL) was simultaneously the youngest school board president in history and the youngest Illinois State Representative. Now at age 29 Congressman Schock, who represents Illinois’ 18th District, is the youngest Member of Congress and the first to be born in the 1980’s. And next to Michele Bachman he’s probably the hottest looking. Uh… let me rephrase that.

Rephrase, indeed.

In addition to serving on the Ways and Means Committee, Illinois Republican Congressman Schock has made the cover of the June issue “Men’s Health,” posing shirtless and showing off his six-pack abs for people of both parties to see.

Representative Shock agreed to appear on the cover of “Men’s Health” as part of his effort to launch a nationwide “Fit for Life Summer Challenge” program. The accompanying article noted that Schock – who is unmarried and is the youngest sitting congressman – is roughly half the average age of all members of Congress. He needs to be half the average age of all the members of Congress to keep up with his own schedule.

For the 112th Congress, Schock was appointed to serve on the highly coveted Ways and Means committee. Within the committee, he is serving on the Trade, Oversight and Social Security subcommittees. He also serves on the committee on House Administration and as the Chairman of the Franking Commission.

Immediately upon taking office in 2009, his colleagues expressed their faith in his abilities by appointing him to the coveted Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. He was also the only Republican freshman selected to serve on the influential Highways and Transit Subcommittee.

Representative Schock also received a seat on the Small Business Committee. Along with this committee he with designated as the Ranking Member of the Contracting and Technology Subcommittee.

House Republican Leadership was so impressed with his ability and voguish ways that they issued the Representative a waiver to serve on a third committee and he was appointed to the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

In his ample spare time the Congressman also hang glides, collects rare stamps, leads a Boy Scout Troop and a Girl Scout Troop (simultaneously), as well as working in a homeless shelter ladling out soup, cashiering at a Goodwill store and washing cars shirtless to raise money for local high school bands. And this is just his Saturday schedule.

And still, if that wasn’t enough, he was then chosen by Leadership to serve as a Deputy Republican Whip. Actually word on the street was that several of the wives of the House GOP leadership … well, never mind.

Representative Schock was assigned the dubious label, “Hottest Freshman,” in a February 2009 reader poll on The Huffington Post. It isn’t too surprising that The Huffington Post would highlight the Conservative Republican Congressman since Arianna has always liked her Congressmen young.

But I digress.

Schock also appeared on The Colbert Report, where Stephen Colbert grilled the Congressman about his “six-pack abs," and then started to stroke the Congressman’s arm and make whimpering noises. Fortunately a commercial break allowed Schock to leave the set with the help of security personnel.

Talk about your proverbial busy beaver. All of this and he was still able to work himself into a six-pack ab-inducting frenzy. He must be the most focused guy in the gym, where he has earned the nickname, ‘The Schock’, from all of his cardio buddies.

Not bad for a kid from Peoria.

Unless you’ve been to Peoria, like I have, you can’t appreciate the scale of his feat on just getting out of there alive. Congressman Schock’s parents are certainly proud of their over achieving son, having placed an early emphasis on a strong work ethic and the dire need to escape Richard Pryor’s hometown. If Peoria wasn’t good enough for Richard Pryor, then it’s not good enough for their son.

It’s nice to see a young man in a hurry reach his potential on the national stage at such an early age, as hard as he was pushed to succeed I’m sure his parents miss him, but one can hardy blame them for wanting to get the Schock out of Peoria.