Paul Ryan: Pressure Is on for Vp Debate

(CNN) -- Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan said Monday that Mitt Romney's widely-applauded debate performance upped the ante for Ryan's own showdown this week.

 

"He raised the bar quite high, that's for sure. Mitt definitely put the pressure on from that perspective," Ryan said on Detroit radio station WJR, just days before his match-up against Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday.

 

A new Gallup poll released Monday indicates Romney experienced a post-debate bounce after last week's event in Denver, and other surveys, including a CNN/ORC International poll, showed debate watchers considered Romney the clear winner.

 

On Sunday, a number of campaign advisers and surrogates conceded President Barack Obama did not meet expectations and hinted the campaign may make "adjustments," using Biden on Thursday as the first attempt to come back.

 

The two vice presidential running mates will face off in their first and only debate at Centre College in Danville, Ken.

 

Ryan, repeating a line he used this weekend in a separate interview, said he expects the vice president to launch at him "like a cannon ball."

 

"Because they had such a bad debate, Joe Biden is just going to come flying at us," Ryan said. "It seems pretty clear that their new strategy is just basically to call us liars, to descend down into a mud pit, and hopefully with enough mudslinging back and forth--and distortion--people get demoralized and they can win by default."

 

The Wisconsin congressman was referring to the Obama campaign's post-debate argument, which used television ads, stump speeches and interview shows to make the case that Romney was dishonest during the first debate, namely on Romney's tax plan. Obama campaign senior adviser David Axelrod on Sunday phrased Romney's performance as unchecked "brazenness."

 

"That's something we're going to have to make an adjustment for in these subsequent debates," Axelrod added on CBS.

 

Playing the expectations game, Ryan continued to raise the bar for Biden, reminding listeners that the former 36-year senator has decades of experience.

 

"He's been on this national stage more than anyone else in politics," Ryan said, further describing Biden as "gifted," "extremely experienced" and a "proven debater."

 

But he said Biden has one big problem to overcome.

 

"He has to defend Barack Obama's record and it's not a very good record to defend," Ryan said.

  

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