Good grief, Obama. It’s just like Charlie Brown and Lucy

Watching Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on Tuesday night reminded me of Charlie Brown and Lucy all over again.

All our loveable Charlie Brown, aka Barack Obama, has to do is kick the football. It shouldn’t be that hard to do. Of course, Lucy, aka Hillary Clinton, is holding the football.

Charlie Brown, trusting that Lucy will play by the rules, charges to the football and tries to kick, only for Lucy to move the football and have him land flat on his back.

Good grief, Barack. When will you learn?! She’s never going to let you kick the football!

While you lay on your back looking up at the stars, let me offer a couple observations. First, stop playing her game. Lucy holds the football. Lucy decides it’s time for you to kick. Lucky decides where to place the football. And finally, just as you are about to kick, Lucy changes the rules by moving the football. Charlie Brown, you will never kick the football as long as Lucy dictate the terms of the game.

You’d think Barack Obama would have picked up on that trend by now. For the last few weeks, he’s been playing Hillary’s game. She determined that Pennsylvania was more important than any of the states that came before or after it. She set it up as a “must win” for them, just as she did for Ohio and Texas. The two states that follow Pennsylvania, Indiana and North Carolina, yield more delegates, but somehow they weren’t as important as Pennsylvania in the HRC grand narrative. As a result, Pennsylvania took on a far greater significance than it might have without her setting the agenda.

Second, she continues to control the narrative on what constitutes a win. To the amazement and disbelief of many observers, Hillary Clinton continues to bend and ply the metrics to suit her fancy. The Democratic rules are fairly straightforward; the candidate with the most delegates wins. This would have been an acceptable had Hillary Clinton been winning, but since she’s not, she has deemed it unacceptable.

Winning has been defined as having the greatest popular vote result, as winning the states most important to Democrats, as winning the states that would correlate to those needed in the electoral college, and as winning states that had primaries only.

Amazingly, pundits and reporters debate and report each of these mutations as though they have been given the stamp of validity from the DNC. Even more amazing, the Obama camp measures themselves by each of these morphing yardsticks while grumbling that we shouldn’t be using them.

Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton will always move the football.

Your only path to victory is in playing your game and controlling the narrative. The rules call for the candidate with the most delegates to win. Do not allow her to change the rules for her convenience. Call her on it loudly and forcefully each time. You cannot waffle on this count at all. If you do, she will always move the football, and you will always end up on your ass.