Nikki Haley Praises Obama Jobs Initiative

President Barack Obama won plaudits from an unexpected source Wednesday evening, when South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley praised the White House for a one of its under-the-radar job creation proposals.

The administration is set to announce tomorrow that seven major infrastructure projects will be expedited as part of the president's "We Can’t Wait" initiative. Among the seven is the deepening of the Charleston Harbor, to be completed by the Army Corps of Engineers nine months earlier than initially planned.

Naturally, the state's governor was ecstatic.

“This is a huge win for Charleston and for all of South Carolina,” Haley said. “Back in February, I stressed to the president how important deepening Charleston’s port was and how frustrating the Army Corps’ timetable was, and I’m thrilled to see the administration has sped up our project.”

This is a very small sliver of the We Can't Wait initiative. And it would be hard to find Republicans who oppose the concept on principle.

But it is still rare for a prominent GOP governor to praise the administration. And even rarer for someone who is thrown, occasionally, into the conversation of Mitt Romney's vice presidential options -- suggesting, perhaps, that Haley recognizes her prospects are slim.