As reported by a Pew Research poll, Romney has managed to close the gap between himself and Obama since the first presidential debate took place and a majority (66%) of registered voters believe that Romney did better in the debates than Obama. Because of Romey's sudden increase in popularity following the debate, both Biden and Ryan have a lot more on their shoulders than most VPs do for the VP debates. One reason for this is that both VP candidates are more than random politicians chosen to fill the spot of VP. Biden, the current VP, has been in office with Obama for the last four years and has had a big influence on Obama's presidency, which makes him partially responsible for everything that has happened under the Obama administration and Ryan, Romney's VP candidate, has served in congress seven times and is the current House Budget Committee chairman. Biden will have to attempt to make up for Obama's loss in popularity following the debate, while Ryan will have to live up to people's expectations following Romney's impressive performance on October 3rd.
Will the VP debates be important enough to change the outcome of the election?
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Apparently Romney believes that the VP debates are crucial to the election due to his efforts to lower expectations for his running mate Ryan (the NBC article is here: http://www.ketknbc.com/news/decision-2012/romney-lowers-expectations-for-ryan-biden-debate). Through such efforts, Romney understands that if Ryan does not perform according to the high expectations people placed on him because of Romney's astounding performance, then this could potentially hurt Romney's approval ratings and possibly his chances for the election. He would rather play it safe and depict Ryan as an "inexperienced debater." However, in my opinion, as long as neither VP does something horribly atrocious, the VP debates should not deeply affect the current statuses of the two presidential candidates. If Ryan performs well, then Romney's popularity will be reinforced. If Biden performs well, perhaps Obama's popularity will increase. Otherwise, no substantial difference should result.
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