Obama’s compliments could hurt GOP 2012 rivals

President Barack Obama may have come up with a good strategy for undermining his potential GOP rivals in 2012: All he has to do is say nice things about them.

As the Washington Post's Perry Bacon notes today, Obama and other White House officials have gone out of their way in recent weeks to praise two potential GOP 2012 rivals, Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman.

And as Obama himself noted when praising Huntsman, his outgoing ambassador to China, that nice talk likely won't sit well with other Republicans.

"I'm sure that him having worked so well with me will be a great asset in any Republican primary," Obama joked.

Earlier this week, David Axelrod, Obama's chief political adviser, went out of his way to tweak Romney, likening Obama's health care plan—which many Republicans despise and want to see repealed--to legislation the former Massachusetts governor enacted when he was in office.

"We got some good ideas from him," Axelrod told USA Today.

(Photo of Obama and Huntsman: Charles Dharapak/AP)