Wendy Davis, classic Texas four-flusher

There was much more of this from Davis and her surrogates, who couldn’t stop talking about Davis’s supposed “struggles” and Abbott’s supposed callousness toward them. A little of this goes a long way, especially since Greg Abbott is a paraplegic. His “struggles” from having his spine crushed at age 26 dwarf those of having a well-to-do husband put you through Harvard Law School while taking care of your children.

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Moreover, the countercharges were dishonest. It wasn’t all that long ago that Wayne Slater’s tough coverage of Karl Rove endeared him to Texas Democrats. And Slater, who has a reputation for probity, stated flatly that he spoke to no one associated with Abbott for his piece on Davis.

In poker, a four-flusher is someone who claims to have a flush—five cards of the same suit—and then shows only four of them when called, hiding the fifth, non-suited card. Wendy Davis’s response when exposed as a four-flusher is to insist the hole card was true—even when everyone sees it isn’t.

As a chaser to such deceit, the campaign added a gaffe in the form of a Wendy Davis statement that Abbott never “walked a day in my shoes.” One doesn’t have to wonder how liberals would respond if George W. Bush had said that about a paraplegic opponent. And then, a surreptitious videotape began circulating in conservative circles purportedly showing Davis backers laughing about Abbott being in a wheelchair.

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