What could possibly go wrong? CNS:

“Even though we’ve turned our economy in the right direction over the past couple of years, many Americans are still hurting, and now is the time to focus on nation building here at home,” Obama said before explaining the partnership in his Saturday address.

In addition to the 11 corporations, the administration also picked a small group of universities to participate in the government-corporate partnership. These include the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Carnegie Mellon University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Stanford University, the University of California-Berkeley and the University of Michigan. The White House did not say how these universities were selected.

In a speech in Pittsburgh Friday announcing the government-corporate partnership program, Obama said that in American history such partnerships have often led the way in enterpreneurial breakthroughs.

“Throughout our history, our greatest breakthroughs have often come from partnerships just like this one,” said Obama. “American innovation has always been sparked by individual scientists and entrepreneurs, often at universities like Carnegie Mellon or Georgia Tech or Berkeley or Stanford. But a lot of companies don’t invest in early ideas because it won’t pay off right away. And that’s where government can step in. ”

The largest single element of the partnership program, as described in the White House statement, will have the Departments of Commerce, Agriculture, Homeland Security, Energy and Defense spending an estimated $300 milion in tax dollars to “co-invest with industry” in the development of products including “small high-powered batteries” and “alternative energy.”

“Starting this summer, the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, Energy, Agriculture, Commerce and other agencies will coordinate a government-wide effort to leverage their existing funds and future budgets, with an initial goal of $300 million, to co-invest with industry in innovative technologies that will jumpstart domestic manufacturing capability essential to our national security and promote the long-term economic viability of critical U.S. industries,” said the White House statement. “Initial investments include small high-powered batteries, advanced composites, metal fabrication, bio-manufacturing, and alternative energy, among others.”

In his weekly address, President Obama explained his view that “nation building here at home” means government “investment” in education and infrastructure, as well as in the development of technology–including the kind of “clean energy” technology that will be one focus of his new government-corporate partnership.

[…]

The White House said the creation of the government-corporate partnership program was based on a recomendation by the President’s Council of Advisers on Science and Technology (PCAST). PCAST is co-chaired by John Holdren, head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

In Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions, a 1973 book that he co-authored with Paul Ehrlich and Anne H. Ehrlich, Holdren and his co-authors wrote: “A massive campaign must be launched to restore a high-quality environment in North America and to de-develop the United States.”

“De-development means bringing our economic system (especially patterns of consumption) into line with the realities of ecology and the global resource situation,” Holdren and the Ehrlichs wrote.

“Resources must be diverted from frivolous and wasteful uses in overdeveloped countries to filling the genuine needs of underdeveloped countries,” Holdren and his co-authors wrote. “This effort must be largely political, especially with regard to our overexploitation of world resources, but the campaign should be strongly supplemented by legal and boycott action against polluters and others whose activities damage the environment. The need for de-development presents our economists with a major challenge. They must design a stable, low-consumption economy in which there is a much more equitable distribution of wealth than in the present one. Redistribution of wealth both within and among nations is absolutely essential, if a decent life is to be provided for every human being.”

In a videotaped interview with CNSNews.com in September 2010, reporter Nicholas Ballays asked Holdren what he meant by a campaign to de-develop the United States.

“What we meant by that was stopping the kinds of activities that are destroying the environment and replacing them with activities that would produce both prosperity and environmental quality,” said Holdren. “Thanks a lot.”

Ballasy followed-up: “And how do you plan on implementing that?”

“Through the free market economy,” Holdren said.

And by “free market economy,” Holdren evidently meant “the government will choose the corporations, the idea people, and will then direct your tax money into the directions into which it sees fit — like, for instance, “green jobs” and the like.

Because the Obama administration — and academics — are more capable of directing progress than something so unpredictable as the actual free market.

And don’t worry: the politicians won’t pick winners and losers, or direct your tax dollars into industries (necessarily directing them away from competitors) in any way that can be construed as “political”. Trust them!

In fact, let’s call this “Free Market 2.0: Now with less “free”!”