One can learn a lot about State Sen. Wendy Davis, the Democratic candidate for governor of Texas, from her battles.

Davis has been battling to restore her tarnished image as a result of nonstop media attention after a column by Wayne Slater in the Dallas Morning News on Jan. 20.  The mostly kid-gloves piece revealed some lies and material omissions in Davis's "I am woman, hear me roar" résumé.

For one, Davis downplayed embellishing and lying on her resume, telling Slater:

My language should be tighter. I'm learning about using broader, looser language. I need to be more focused on the detail.

That brings us to an earlier battle Davis waged against her female opponent in Davis's first political race for a seat on the Fort Worth City Council in 1996.

The facts, according to Davis, are included in her lawsuit against the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in 1997.  Davis sued the paper for libel for publishing an editorial critical of Davis's "dirty" campaign tactics against her opponent, Cathy Hirt.

Pleadings from the lawsuit are available on the "Real Wendy" website hosted by the Republican Party of Texas.

Davis also claimed that the Star-Telegram damaged her reputation by failing to report on information that Davis gave the paper about Hirt.  Davis accused Hirt of wrongly referring to herself as an attorney while failing to include in her bio that she had failed the Tennessee bar exam three times.  According to Davis, the paper "chose to whitewash Hirt's conduct while demonizing Davis' conduct for trying to direct attention to the outrageous conduct of her opponent."

Replay that line.  Davis accused Hirt of "outrageous conduct" for embellishing her résumé and omitting key facts from the public.

Davis claimed that as a result of the Star-Telegram's conduct, she "has suffered and continues to suffer damages to her mental health, her physical health, her right to pursue public offices now and in the future, and to her legal career."

Was it her ongoing mental illness, or was Davis absent the day they taught the First Amendment at Harvard?

Davis's lawsuit was dismissed on summary judgment, which was upheld by an appellate court in 2000.  The Texas Supreme Court refused to hear the case.

Davis is currently attacking her opponent, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, in a pathetic maneuver to blame him for Slater's column.

Slater refuted Davis as soon as she posted her snarky accusation about Abbott on her blog on Monday, saying he talked to "zero" people in the Abbott campaign while doing research for his column.  Even so, Davis released a foot-in-mouth statement Tuesday directed at Abbottt, saying he hasn't "walked a day in my shoes."  Abbott is a paraplegic who's been confined to a wheelchair for 30 years.

For the record, Slater, co-author of Bush's Brain, can't be dismissed as a hostile conservative.  Likewise, the Dallas Morning News chose Davis for its 2013 "Texan of the Year" Award, and she became the Democrats' choice for governor after planting her pink running shoes on the floor of the Texas Senate last August as she filibustered against unborn children for 11 hours.

Standing for late-term abortion is standing on "sacred ground," according to Davis.

The liberal media hailed her around the world -- unlike how they treated Ted Cruz, who was castigated for his marathon speech on the U.S. Senate floor opposing ObamaCare.

Days before Slater's column was published, Davis appeared with fellow Democrat and feminist Maria Shriver on the Today Show in a gushing segment titled "On Her Own Two Feet."  Said Shriver, "At the age of 18, Davis found herself pregnant and married."

Davis and Shriver shared a redacted version of the former's bio.  They omitted that Davis's second husband, Jeff Davis, took care of their children and paid her way through two years of college at Texas Christian University, and then through Harvard Law School.  Mr. Davis cashed in his 401(k) and assumed a 10-year loan for Mrs. Davis's tuition.  Mrs. Davis left her husband the day after he paid off the loan.  She agreed to give him custody of the children and pay him child support.

"On Her Own Two Feet Planted on the Shoulders of Her Husband" probably wouldn't fire up the gals at NOW in their battle to help Hillary Clinton put another crack in her glass ceiling.

Davis's next battle could be with a federal judge for committing perjury in a federal redistricting case.  She repeated some of her bogus biography to support her intervenor status in the case as a representative of minority rights.

As the Good Book says, "[t]he one who guards his mouth and tongue keeps himself out of trouble" (Proverbs 21:23).

Ignoring that advice should keep Davis out of the Texas governor's mansion.

Jan LaRue is senior legal analyst with the American Civil Rights Union.