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Building work on the £120million new Main Stand remains on schedule but the Reds won’t be able to host matches until mid to late August.
As a result Anfield officials have already submitted a request to the Premier League to play their opening two league games of the 2016/17 campaign on their travels.
The home leg of a potential Europa League qualifier would also have to be moved. Liverpool are considering possible venues with Bolton’s Macron Stadium and Wigan’s DW Stadium the most likely options.
There is no prospect of Jurgen Klopp’s side playing at Goodison Park, while opening up Anfield with a heavily reduced capacity would be problematic. Both Bolton and Wigan would welcome the financial windfall of hosting the Reds.
Liverpool sit ninth in the Premier League ahead of Saturday’s home clash with title-chasing Tottenham but they are only seven points adrift of fourth placed Manchester City with a game in hand.
A top-four finish or winning the Europa League would secure Champions League qualification and alleviate any fears of an early start to the next European campaign.
Fifth spot in the Premier League guarantees passage to the Europa League group stage but if Liverpool qualify for Europe by finishing sixth or seventh they face the prospect of entering at the third qualifying round. The first leg is scheduled to take place on July 28 with the second leg on August 4.
The new Main Stand will increase Anfield’s capacity to around 54,000 and Liverpool remain confident that the redeveloped ground will be ready as expected in August.
All the seating will be in place but parts of the new stand won’t be complete until later in the season with temporary dressing rooms for players and officials in the underground car park in operation until around Christmas.
Sixth place in the Premier League will be good enough for Liverpool to qualify for Europe if Capital One Cup winners Manchester City finish in the top five. Seventh place would also offer a European spot if either West Ham or Manchester United win the FA Cup and finish in the top six.
As well as forcing Liverpool to play a home game away from Anfield, a European qualifier would also be problematic in terms of the club’s pre-season tour plans.
The Reds are taking part in the International Champions Cup during a July training camp in California. They will face Chelsea in Pasadena on July 27 before taking on AC Milan in Santa Clara three days later.
They are also expected to play a third game on the East Coast of America before returning to Europe to complete their International Champions Cup commitments against Barcelona on August 6.
Klopp told the ECHO last week that they have already drawn up plans to fly a team home from the States if Liverpool are involved in a European tie on July 28 - less than 24 hours after the game against Chelsea.<|endoftext|>When I signed up for Secret Santa I figured I'd be happy with whatever I got. Turns out my SS has gotten me one of the best Christmas presents I have ever gotten in my life!
I received two DVD sets, one of Twin Peaks and one of Mr.Show, These are my two favorite shows ever.
I also received a sample pack of K-cups, a convenient tray holder for these K-cups, a K-cup for regular coffee grounds and all of these accessories go towards... MY NEW KEURIG COFFEE MACHINE!
I've had this before at friends houses but always wanted one myself, unfortunately they are very expensive. My SS was extremely generous to get me this and it is certainly one of the nicest things I've owned and definitely the nicest in regards to things in the kitchen.
I drink coffee every day so this is a fantastic gift for me. Thank you!
I only have one picture of the set so far plus a picture of one of our cats wearing a Santa hat for good measure but I'll post more soon.
Right now I'm enjoying some of this myself but as soon as I have people over we'll all be drinking it up and I'll get a photo for good measure.
THIS STUFF ROCKS! Hope everyone has a great holiday. I'll update again soon.<|endoftext|>Last week, some students at University of Chicago, where I attend, proposed a resolution to our College Council to divest from Chinese weapons manufacturers, in protest of China's severe human rights abuses and its long-standing occupation of Tibet.
Members of the council were quick to condemn the resolution, and for good reason. The members noted it was political, and disrespectful to Chinese students. Other members noted that Chinese students should be given time to respond to the presenters with a counter-presentation. One representative even suggested that the College Council issue an apology to Chinese students for even considering the resolution. The resolution was tabled indefinitely.
Curiously, when a few weeks earlier the same College Council passed a nearly identical resolution condemning Israel, no one suggested an apology. These same representatives argued why it was their moral imperative to condemn Israel. They were determined to push this through at all costs, and despite requests, they didn't even offer the other side an opportunity to present.
Over the past few weeks I have been told that Jews "don't count" as a minority. I have been accused of using anti-semitism to justify oppression. All I want to know is why my campus doesn't treat anti-semitism with the same rigor with which it treats any other forms of bias.
When Jews stood before the council, and asked that it recognize the Jewish right to self-determination, a basic right for all people, people in the room laughed. One representative noted that "If we were to affirm the right to Jewish self-determination … it takes away from the intent of the resolution".
Students in the room that day called us racists and murderers and "apartheid supporters", for even thinking we, as Jews, could have a voice in the discussion over the one small state we call our own. A Jewish student was chided "You are racist and you are against me and my family’s existence". It was uncivil, and unproductive, but the council-members did not once that day condemn the personal nature of these attacks, or defend the rights of the opposition to make their case.
At one point, a student questioned the presenters, members of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), about their organization allegedly holding a moment of silence for Palestinians who were killed while trying to murder Jewish Civilians. One of the presenters confirmed the moment, then responded without missing a beat "Palestinians have a right to honor their martyrs".
If the killing of any other ethnic group had been celebrated, the University would make grief counselors available. It would send out mass emails of condemnation. They would suspend the organization responsible, and possibly the students involved in it. The organization would certainly not have any credibility to present to the student government. Since the victims were Jews though, their celebration of murder went unchallenged. The representatives never even brought the issue up.
On the third slide of the presentation in favor of the resolution, presenters claimed that voting against the resolution would mean "maintaining a system of domination by Jews". The presenters were relying on one of the most common, long-standing, overtly anti-semitic tropes to make their case, and our representatives said nothing.
On the very next slide, the presenters shared a series of maps which MSNBC once famously referred to as deceptive, and "completely wrong". The maps (inaccurately) depict border changes between Israelis and Palestinians from 1946-200. What's most striking is the label though: "Jewish land versus Palestinian land over time". Not one representative questioned the label. Not one representative questioned the map. The only thing they were willing to question was the right for some state of Israel to exist, and the right to Jewish self-determination.
Courtesy: UofCDivest There were about 500,000 Jews in Israel in 1948, but if you saw this map you would never guess that. This also uses "Jewish" in place of "Israeli".
Student after student at that first meeting stood to explain to representatives how political and contentious the BDS movement was. They pointed out the movement's ties to terror and anti-semitism. Some suggested the representatives compromise and call for divestment, but drop the explicit ties to the BDS movement. On this issue, finally, our representatives spoke out.
"As a voting member, I don’t think it’s my job to appease people who don’t support BDS".
On the China resolution, representatives were quick to point out that it "minimize[d] this issue into a political ploy". When it came to Israel though, the Council was happy to attempt to speak for its 5,000 constituents without hearing from the other side. They even violated procedure to shut out student voices one meeting, to expedite the vote. The one student they allowed to speak at the meeting was an activist in favor of the resolution.
One representative pointed out to the council that "this [BDS resolution] is being passed a week after a presentation for 15 minutes from one side of the debate, and the opposition ... was never formally given time before College Council". Another pointed out that "it is disingenuous to say that we have moral voice to represent the students and speak on this issue". That didn't stop the same representative who seemed so concerned about minimizing the struggles of the Chinese people as a political ploy, from voting for another political ploy.
Their coldness in minimizing the struggles of Jews, living with a legacy of being expelled and exterminated, was mind-boggling to me.
Then again, these biases, and suppressions of speech shouldn't surprise me, given the system that these Representatives work in. They control $2 million in funding for events and clubs, and they wield that power to silence dissenting voices.
When SJP held events in support of the divest resolution, one of the sponsors was University of Chicago's own Office of Diversity and Inclusion.
This week is Yom Hashoah, which commemorates the six million Jews that were murdered by the Nazis during World War II. On this day of remembrance, we say "Never forget. Never again". Yom Hashoah also commemorates an international commitment not to repeat the mistakes of the past.
Sadly, fifty-three years after this day was first honored, we seem to be forgetting those lessons. As a campus we're remarkably tolerant of gender, race, and sexuality in general. Why is it that we're so uncaring about this one, very real form of racism?
Update (4/05): One thing I didn’t originally emphasize enough is how grateful I am to the 4-5 representatives on the council who genuinely recognized what this resolution was, and spoke and stood against it. I’ve tried my best throughout this article not to name names, but I do want thank those representatives.<|endoftext|>Vermont became the 17th state to eliminate criminal penalties for the possession of small amounts of marijuana. (Photo11: AFP/Getty Images)
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Maryland will become the 19th state to approve a medical marijuana program, but it's unclear when one will be up and running.
Gov. Martin O'Malley's spokeswoman, Raquel Guillory, confirmed Wednesday that the governor will sign the measure. That will happen at a bill-signing ceremony Thursday, along with dozens of other measures, including a repeal of the death penalty.
The medical marijuana bill allows academic medical research centers to establish programs to dispense marijuana to sick patients.
While state analysts have projected a program would not be up and running until 2016, supporters say they are hopeful some research centers will move faster now that they have seen how the program would work.
Some medical marijuana advocates, though, say the bill doesn't go far enough to get marijuana to sick people.
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/18dg9WX<|endoftext|>It’s not just the U.S. military that is aggressively pursuing renewable-energy solutions to battlefield challenges: The Australian National University (ANU) is reporting on the development of “wearable lightweight solar panels” for that country’s Department of Defense.
ANU said the panels were developed at its Center for Sustainable Energy Systems as part of a $2.3 million contract with the Australian military. A chief goal of the project was to find a away to power the electronic devices that soldiers are carrying “to enhance their close combat tactical awareness and survivability,” ANU said.
Project Manager Igor Skryabin said that while battery systems have improved considerably in recent years, they still end up adding to a soldier’s load. “The development of these wearable solar cells will now allow soldiers to generate power in the field and reduce the need for batteries for their electronic devices,” Skryabin said. “They will also establish a power supply that keeps electronic devices operational throughout the duration of missions.”