• Yesterday U.S. Senator Mark Begich’s campaign manager issued a written statement that explained Sen. Begich was waiting for all of the ballots to be counted before making a definitive statement about the race. Dan Sullivan’s campaign manager told the Fairbanks News Miner, “The math doesn’t look great for Mark Begich.” For Begich to become Alaska’s Comeback Kid, he would need a substantial percentage of the uncounted votes, bucking the trend so far seen.

• Alexandra Gutierrez has an ingenious spreadsheet that shows AK Senate race projections. Here is also another spreadsheet that explains how the votes by precinct have come in as of Nov. 5 at 5:30 pm.

• Politico Magazine does not hold back on naming the worst predictors of the 2014-midterm elections. Don’t worry; this is not some boring piece with spreadsheets and graphs (though graphs are fun and shouldn’t be poo-pooed).  They have known political players named, what they said, when and to whom.  Favorite quote of the piece is DNC Chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz on This Week: “I think we’re going to hold the Senate and the reason that we’re going to hold the Senate…is because we have a ground game that, I know [RNC Chairman] Reince [Priebus] would take ours over theirs any day of the week. …Rick Scott is going to go down to defeat on Tuesday.” One thing I’ve learned in the last months: candidates and parties who have top-line ground games don’t brag about them.

• E & E News has a piece about that fate of the natural gasline in a Bill Walker administration. Rep. Mike Hawker is quoted, pessimistically saying that Walker might set the progress back five to 10 years. “Everything we’ve accomplished on gas pipeline development is at stake,” he said. Larry Persily takes a longer view and says that the companies aren’t going to walk away from the project.

• Now that the shock of what happened on Tuesday has started to wear off, The Hill reports that Democratic members and lawmakers are doing some soul searching to figure out what they did wrong and how to fix it. Meanwhile the Republicans are busy putting the basic framework of Congress back on track and trying to draft their legislative mandate.

• Last year’s Alaska State Troopers helicopter crash was determined by the National Transportation Safety Board to be caused in part by the pilot’s decision to fly into bad weather and the State Trooper’s inadequate safety management according to the Washington Post.

• So now that a person can legally stoke up in Alaska, regulations will require attention from state legislators and their staff. The AP has an amazing story full of information they need to know before heading down to Juneau.

• Anchorage might be focusing on three to-close-to-call state house races, but The Alaska Commons has an article by a Don Ortiz supporter regarding this campaign’s tightest lead of all the races: Ortiz up by 19 votes over Chere Klein as of the last count.

• Pebble Mine has received some national press due to the passage of Ballot Measure 3. Both The Hill and the San Luis Tribune have pieces highlighting Alaska’s vote to add an additional step to Pebble’s permitting process.

• The AK DOT has announced that the deadline for public comment on the Juneau Access Road project, aka The Road has now been extended to November 25. For details about the proposed project and/or to submit comment, the Juneau Empire has you covered.

• Mark your calendars Fairbanks: the AK Department of Environmental Conservation is holding their first work session to tackle wintertime air pollution so the city meets EPA’s requirements. The Fairbanks News Miner has the backstory on this issue and details about the work session.

• Billionaire Tom Steyer spent $65 million of his own money in the 2014-midterm elections to make climate change a top tier issue for voters, and hopefully a national issue for 2016. What did he get for his money?  Two (Colorado, Iowa) of the four states (the others being Michigan and New Hampshire) went Red and the Mercury News making the determination that if Steyer had an impact, it was largely on the margins while the Director of UNH Survey Center saying, “It was a waste of money.”

• Real Clear Politics has a clip from Amand Rashad’s interview with Michael Jordan where His Airness threw some serious shade on President Obama’s golfing game calling the president a “hack” and a “shitty golfer.” Not to be undone, Obama responded with “He might want to spend more time thinking about the Bobcats or maybe the Hornets” during a radio interview with Wisconsin’s WJMR.

• Military recruiters will be allowed back on Anchorage public school property for those that complete the new regulations to get access to our children. The Dispatch explains that recruiters will now be required to attend meetings regarding protocol and other issues as well as file paperwork.  Superintendent Ed Graff explained that the new regulations were put into place because “”When students come to school each day, they deserve to be safe and treated with respect by everyone in the building, including visitors.”  I don’t know if listening to a lecture and filling out some papers will make students safer from a grown man intent on sexually assaulting them, but it’s at least a step in the right direction.

Contact Amanda Coyne at amandamcoyne@yahoo.com