It's Always The Tick Season in Washington

The federal government refuses to secure our borders, but it will go out of its way to secure advantages for labor unions.

Boeing Co. (BA) should be forced to open a Washington state assembly line after violating workers’ rights by building a 787 Dreamliner plant in South Carolina, away from its Seattle-area union labor force, the U.S. government said.

The National Labor Relations Board said in a complaint today that the planemaker was “motivated by a desire to retaliate for past strikes and chill future strike activity” when it decided in 2009 to construct the new factory. The company said it will “vigorously contest” the complaint.

Apparently a business is no longer allowed to pursue profitable strategies but must instead prostrate itself before those that would destroy it. It's like working out and eating right to stay healthy so you can be a host for ticks.

“This is a very critical, precedent-setting situation,” said Harley Shaiken, a labor professor at the University of California at Berkeley. “This would have been unusual at any moment, but it’s especially unusual with the backdrop where collective bargaining is literally being unwound for public- sector workers in Wisconsin and Ohio.”

Boeing’s choice of South Carolina marked its first departure from the Puget Sound hub where it has built all its commercial jets. Relations with the Machinists union have been strained by four strikes since 1989, including the most recent, two-month walkout at the end of 2008.

Ticks borrow into their host and resist all attempts to dislodge them. I remember we used to burn ticks out of our dogs with a lit cigarette.