The Bush Doctrine has had a profound impact on the U.S. sociopolitical climate. Following the September 11, 2001 attacks, the U.S. government waged a “war on terrorism” in order to justify and sustain a set of militarized domestic and foreign policies. During this time of crisis, with so much power ceded to the executive branch, the Bush Administration’s was able to both define the nation’s response and limit alternative interpretations of the events by relying primarily on epideictic rhetoric. The Bush narrative was framed by stark dualisms (“you are either with us or with the terrorists”), and it outlined a powerful set of avowals that constituted American citizens as part of a sacred community involved in an epic battle against evil. While several scholars agree that Bush’s rhetoric was successful in meeting the exigencies created by the attacks on American soil, this paper focuses on how Bush’s discourse created a formidable challenge for any opponent seeking the White House in the 2004 elections. More specifically I argue that Bush continued to rely on this epideictic style as an argumentative strategy during the 2004 presidential debates. Because epideictic rhetoric shapes the world that provides the backdrop of values and beliefs through which deliberative judgements are made, Bush’s continued reliance on this genre of discourse allowed him to maintain interpretive dominance without needing to explicate his policies in detail. An analysis of the three presidential debates reveals that Bush’s debate rhetoric focused on several broad themes that included; a continued enemy threat, America’s divine mission to fight this “ideology of hate,” defining the presidency through the role of commander-and-chief, and the success of American endeavors to bring justice and spread democracy to formerly despotic nations. Bush’s reliance on an epideictic style enabled him to maintain his vision of the world throughout the 2004 campaign cycle and it forced the opposition to argue within the discursive terrain of the incumbent political party.