(CNSNews.com) – When a House panel holds a hearing Wednesday afternoon examining the impact of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy regarding homosexuals in the military, no one from the Defense Department will testify.
 
That’s because no one from the military has been invited to testify, according to Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), sponsor of a bill to overturn the military’s ban on homosexuality.
 
“The truth of the matter is, we don’t (have anyone from the Defense Department scheduled) because we know what they would say,” Tauscher said at a Tuesday news conference. “We know that they would say, ‘That’s the law, ma’am. We salute smartly and we do what the law says.’”
 
In fact, Tauscher admitted that the entire reason for the hearing is to lay the groundwork for efforts after the election, when she and subcommittee chair Rep. Susan Jones (D-Calif.) hope to get a newly elected President Barrack Obama to make an issue of homosexuals in the military.
 
“This is not a question of whether the committee can pass this out today,” Tauscher said. “This bill is not going to be brought for a vote in this Congress. We do not believe that it is appropriate to bring a bill forward that the president won’t sign.”
 
Tauscher admitted she is merely trying to lobby for the bill in the hope that the next president, whom she told reporters will be Sen. Barrack Obama (D-Ill.), the expected Democratic nominee, who she said has indicated would take up the issue early in his administration, if elected.
 
Tauscher’s bill, meanwhile, reportedly does not have the support of the Democratic chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), or of many of the Democrats on the committee.
 
When pressed if she had canvassed the members, or Skelton, and knew where the bill stood, Tauscher was defensive.
 
“There’s no reason to do that, since we’re not going to bring the bill forward until we have an environment where we can not only pass the bill, but get it signed,” Tauscher said.
 
“In our business, we can pass bills all day long, but if the Senate doesn’t take them up and pass them, or if president doesn’t sign them, it’s a lot like wasting your time,” she said.
 
One witness who is expected to testify in support of barring homosexuals from military service, surprisingly supports not inviting the military to the hearing.
 
Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, said even the Defense Department doesn’t understand that “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is not the law of the land. .
 
“They know what the policy is, but they don’t know what the law is,” Donnelly said, “and they don’t understand the difference between the two. In their public statements, I have seen no indication that they really understand what the difference is.”
 
Donnelly, who supports barring homosexuals from military service, said the 1993 “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy is a set of policies and an enforcement scheme that President Bill Clinton put into place in 1993 after Congress passed a law.
 
“The statute -- Section 654, Title X -- states clearly that ‘homosexuality is incompatible with military service,’ ” Donnelly told CNSNews.com. “After he signed the law, President Clinton then put into place regulations that are inconsistent with the law.”
 
Donnelly said the Clinton policy is clearly illegal – “‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ suggests that you can serve in the armed forces as long as you don’t say that you are homosexual.”
 
The Pentagon did not return calls. But retired Army Lt. Col. Bob Maginnis, who has testified at previous congressional hearings on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” said the move to remove the ban on homosexuals in the military is political and has nothing to do with the needs of the military.
 
“For someone in the middle of politically correct Washington to hold a hearing suggesting that our armed forces – some of whom are dying and getting wounded on the battlefields today –are somehow going to be better armed forces if we remove the barriers to a politically powerful group and, all of the sudden, make them a mainstream part of this organization, is the height of arrogance,” Maginnis said.
 
Obama has indicated that he would support efforts to eliminate a ban on homosexuals serving in the military.
 
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the likely Republican nominee, has indicated he is opposed to making changes to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
 
Wednesday’s hearing is taking place in Armed Services Committee’s subcommittee on personnel.