The chairman of the National Labor Relations Board under the last Democratic administration says the current incarnation of the panel under President Obama has gone too far in its lawsuit against Boeing.

The NLRB has sued Boeing, which has been building 787 airplanes at its unionized plant near Seattle, arguing that the aircraft manufacturer is retaliating against strikes by unions in its home of Washington state by opening a plant to build more 787s in South Carolina.
 
South Carolina is a “right to work” state, where employers are not obliged to join a union.

Bill Gould, who led the labor board from 1994 to 1998 after being appointed to the panel by former President Bill Clinton, said he had never seen a case like Boeing's come before the NLRB during his tenure.

"The Boeing case is unprecedented," he said in an interview with Slate magazine. "I agree with much of what this board has done and is likely to do, but I don't agree with what the general counsel has done in the Boeing case.

Air Force One had to attempt its landing in Connecticut twice on President Obama's trip there Wednesday.

Obama is traveling to New London, Conn., to give a commencement speech at the United States Coast Guard Academy. According to pool reports, his plane aborted its initial landing attempt at Bradley Air Force Base before landing safely the second time at 10:02 a.m.

"FAA confirming a missed approach at 950a," the pool reporter quoted Mark Knoller of CBS as saying. "Blames bad visibility. Says AF-1 had to go around and landed safely on 2nd try."

The White House confirmed the incident late Wednesday morning.

"The pilot was in the process of landing but due to weather the pilot decided to circle around and then landed the plane," White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said. "This is a standard and safe procedure."

The president was scheduled to make the 70-minute drive in his motorcade and deliver the graduation speech at 11:30 a.m.

One of the nation's most-watched Senate races next year could be affected by what would appear to be a local transportation issue in Northern Virginia, a Washington newspaper posited Wednesday.

The Washington Examiner said in an op-ed that former Virginia Gov. and Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine's electoral prospects could be hampered by cost overruns of the planned extension of Washington's MetroRail to Dulles International Airport in Northern Virginia. Kaine is running to replace retiring Sen. Jim Webb (D) and will likely face former Sen. George Allen (R), also a former Virginia governor who has had his own share of stumbles over the years.

But Kaine was governor when the agreement was made to use revenues from the Dulles Toll Road to build a new transit line to the airport, the newspaper said Wednesday. And with plans now calling for an underground station to be built, the Examiner says the tolls commuters in the crucial northern swing portion of the state pay could go up, which might bring down Kaine's poll numbers.

"Both presumptive nominees have a lot of baggage," the op-ed said. "But while Allen is dragging his behind him, Kaine's baggage is out front — waiting for him to trip over it.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

A group of scientists are saying not so fast to the Transportation Security Administration's evidence that its body scanners are safe.

Conservatives are saying the redistribution of Florida's $2.4 billion in high-speed rail money is really a bailout for Amtrak.

A JetBlue Airlines plane was struck by lightning, causing examination into whether lightning strikes could still cause plane crashes.

Delta Airlines is bringing new foods and iPads to the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport next year.

The chairman of the House Oversight Committee said Tuesday that he was going to look into the changed National Mediation Board rules for airline and railroad employees.

The NMB changed the rules last year to ensure that absentee votes were not counted as votes against forming an union.

That was later undone by the House, but the proposed rule consumed debate over the Federal Aviation Administration authorization bill. It also caught the attention of President Obama, who promised to veto the entire FAA bill if the NMB rules were undone.

Now, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) says he wants to take a look at whether the NMB was trying to "advance a partisan policy agenda."

The White House continued a recent trend Tuesday by alleging that GOP-backed offshore drilling plans would undercut safety and environmental reforms while stopping short of issuing a veto threat.

The White House issued a formal “statement of administration policy” that takes issue with a Senate GOP bill that’s slated for a test vote Wednesday. It follows similar statements on GOP drilling plans that recently passed the House (see here and here).

The Senate bill, which mirrors plans the House approved this month, sets deadlines for holding offshore lease sales and acting on industry drilling permit requests.

“S. 953 would undermine the Administration's work to ensure that environmental analysis required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is conducted in a rigorous manner.  S. 953 would hastily open areas of the Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, and the Atlantic to leasing, and require the Department of the Interior (DOI) to hold multiple lease sales in the Gulf and Alaska using outdated NEPA analysis that was conducted before the Deepwater Horizon oil spill,” the White House argues.

The Obama administration has gone to great lengths recently to tout the successes of the American auto companies in Detroit, but Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood was in Tennessee Tuesday talking up Nissan.
 
The Japan-based automaker has a sizable American presence, and the company is building new lithium car batteries at its Franklin, Tenn., plant. The batteries will be used for Nissan's Leaf electric vehicle, which is joining Chevrolet's Volt in the electrically powered car market.
 
The U.S. Department of Energy has issued several grants and loans to encourage the development of electric cars. LaHood said Tuesday that, with gas prices soaring, it was even more important that fuel-efficient cars be build in America.

Obama administration officials on Tuesday defended the president's proposal to place Amtrak under an executive agency budget instead of being reliant on direct appropriations from Congress. 

Currently, Congress subsidizes Amtrak operations, but President Obama in his 2012 budget proposal called for placing its funding under the Federal Railroad Administration.

FRA Administrator Joseph Szabo told a Senate committee the plan makes sense.

"The [fiscal] 2012 proposal builds on the paradigm of federal rail investment created by [The Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act]," Szabo said in a hearing of the Senate Appropriations Committee’s subcommittee on Transportation and Urban Development.

This is the second time the Congressional Budget Office has presented the idea as an option for generating revenue.