> I can't comprehend how a federal body would aid a private company like this when the ramifications could be so severe (threat to life and to the FAA's public credibility).

Entrenched government agencies never appear to have concern about public credibility. Their security is guaranteed not by the public but by politicians, and these same politicians are the beneficiaries of donations by large corporations like Boeing. Further, large corporations employ lots of people who would be rather pissed off if they lost their job. So by punishing the large corporation, the agency would in effect be giving an incentive to its key stakeholder (politicians) an incentive to punish the agency (limiting authority, etc).

The world is a messed up place, where agencies tasked to do a very specific thing undermine that task out of self-preservation.