Biden Addresses More Than 600 at Virginia Tech - FOX 21/27 WFXR Roanoke/WWCW Lynchburg News, Weather

Biden Addresses More Than 600 at Virginia Tech

A much more subdued Vice President Joe Biden greeted the crowd of more than 600 at McComas Hall early Wednesday afternoon.

Biden made headlines on Tuesday for some controversial comments he made about the Republican Presidential ticket of Mitt Romney and running mate Paul Ryan. But Wednesday the vice president reeled in some of the criticism.

"Both Mitt Romney and Congressman Ryan are decent, honorable men," Biden told the crowd. "They just have a fundamentally different view of things than we do."

In a speech very similar to ones he made during campaign stops in Danville and Wytheville on Tuesday, Biden touted President Obama's middle-out strategy with the economy while also attacking Republicans for preventing progress in Washington.

"The Republican Party, from the day we took office in the Congress, has engaged in obstruction," Biden said. "They've slowed our progress but they have not stopped it."

Biden seemed to gain energy from the crowd, especially while talking about education, a key difference from Tuesday's speeches.

The vice president even made a promise to the Virginia Tech students in attendance.

"We rank 16 in the world in the percentage of our population we graduate from college," he said. "The president and I are determined by 2020 for us to be number one again."

It's a promise the Obama campaign hopes will bring back enthusiasm from young voters, a key to the president's victory in 2008.

"I think we're going to win for one over-arching reason," Biden told the crowd. "We simply have the best candidate - period - in Barack Obama."