This is a quiet week on Capitol Hill, with both House and Senate taking their Independence Day breaks. (For news about a more compelling July 4th tradition, head over here.) While polls show great dissatisfaction with Congress and its inability to address critical issues, it looks like the House may soon devote debate time to demanding apologies for wrongs that date back decades. The first is the Armenian genocide — the name given to the annihilation of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Turks between 1915 and 1923. Supporters of legislation to call for greater attention to the episode are taking heart that the measure now has the support of a majority of the House — 218 representatives. They hope for ‘timely’ floor action (under some definition of ‘timely’ that I’m not familiar with). A read of the legislation (see below) makes clear that the genocide — while clearly a crime against humanity worthy of attention and remembrance — hasn’t exactly been ignored, either. Opponents of the measure — including the government of Turkey — are reportedly hoping that it will not be considered at a time geared to influence elections in that country:

Perhaps a more salient measure is a resolution calling for the government of Japan to ‘formally acknowledge, apologize, and accept historical responsibility in a clear and unequivocal manner for its Imperial Armed Force’s coercion of young women into sexual slavery.’ Proponents of the legislation argue that Japan has never properly acknowledged its actions in World War II. Indeed, Ed Morrissey writes an excellent piece today regarding the effort in Japan to ‘gloss over’ its crimes during the conflict. The ‘comfort women’ resolution — sponsored by Representative Mike Honda — has already become a hot topic in Japanese politics: