One of the continuing wonders of the L.A. mayor's race is watching Eric Garcetti — the silicon-coated, Donald Shoup-reading, fair-trade-smartphone-toting utopian — recasting himself as the “back to basics” candidate. 

What's even more amazing is that Wendy Greuel — who built a career on pothole-filling — lets him get away with it. Anyway, Garcetti keeps at it today with his first TV ad of the runoff, titled, yep, “Back to Basics.”
Here it is:

“As your Mayor, I'll make L.A. business friendly and lead a new commitment to job training like we have right here in my district,” Garcetti says. “I'll be a back-to-basics Mayor, making sure that tax payers get their money's worth along with the services they deserve.”

This ad does have a more dynamism to it than Garcetti's primary ad, which looked like it was shot on somebody's Hi-8 camera. We've heard he's spending about $300,000 this week on TV time for the ad.
Greuel, meanwhile, continues to spend heavily on two ads, one touting her endorsements and another attacking Garcetti on digital billboards. This week and last, the Greuel campaign spent a total of $1.4 million on the ads.

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