Alaska Governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and husband Todd announced Monday that their unmarried daughter Bristol, 17, is pregnant.

It wasn't the only surprise disclosure about Palin Monday, as it was revealed that she has hired a lawyer to defend her in an ethics investigation into her firing of her state's public safety commissioner.

Both the revelations overshadowed the start of the Republican convention, which was already thrown off-course by hurricane Gustav.

A statement, released by the John McCain campaign, says that Bristol intends to marry the father of her child, only known as Levi. The family has asked that media respect their privacy in this matter.

"Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned," the statement said. "We're proud of Bristol's decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents. As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support.

Speaking from the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, CTV Washington Bureau Chief Tom Clark told CTV Newsnet, that the announcement "might have an impact on the conservative base of the Republican party. But I don't know if there's any political mileage in attacking a 17-year-old girl who's pregnant."

This news comes in the midst of some intense scrutiny of Palin by left-wing bloggers who, over the weekend, speculated that Gov. Palin was actually the grandmother of her fifth child born in April.

McCain adviser Mark Salter told The Associated Press the campaign announced the daughter's pregnancy to rebut the rumours.

McCain's advisers have said that their campaign knew of the pregnancy before Palin was picked as their VP-nominee.

But the Anchorage Daily News is reporting that Palin's governor-office press secretary, Bill McAllister, was asked on Saturday if Bristol was pregnant.

"I don't know. I have no evidence that Bristol's pregnant," he told the newspaper. He said Monday that he learned of pregnancy with everyone else.

In Michigan, Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama condemned the rumours saying, ""I think people's families are off limits, and people's children are especially off limits."

He also adamantly denied the anonymous online claims that his campaign helped spread the rumours.

"I am offended by that statement," Obama said. "Our people were not involved in any way in this, and they will not be. And if I ever thought that there was somebody in my campaign that was involved in something like that, they'd be fired."

As for the probe in Alaska, a Republican-dominated legislative committee is investigating whether Palin fired Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan after he refused to fire a state trooper who had divorced Palin's sister.

Her decision to fire the lawyer was revealed by the investigative committee.

Tucker Eskew, a senior McCain adviser said of the news: "The governor of every state gets legal counsel, and this attorney is part of a weeks-old effort to provide this governor defence in a series of outlandish, politically motivated charges. ... It is a matter of her job and is not recent, and it is not related to her selection on the McCain-Palin ticket."

Intense scrutiny

When John McCain made his VP announcement Friday, the pick was seen by political pundits as risky -- but with a significant upside.

The pick of Palin, who is staunchly anti-abortion and pro-gun rights, was hoped to shore up a McCain weakness by strengthening his support from social conservatives.

Additionally, in her debut VP candidate speech Friday, Palin touted her success in nixing the "Bridge to Nowhere" project -- which would have connected Gravina Island with the Ketchikan airport. It was the type of "pork-barrel project" that McCain has promised to fight against if elected president.

But the Anchorage Daily News is reporting that Palin actually supported the project originally when she campaigned for governor in 2006.

Another Alaska Newspaper, the Daily News-Miner, had a similar article on Sunday. And on Saturday, one of that newspaper's columnists praised her record as governor but wrote "in no way does her year-and-a-half as governor of Alaska qualify her to be vice president or president of the United States."

It's the type of scrutiny that the McCain camp will increasingly see as the media catches up on the background of the surprise choice.

But it's nothing compared to the online smear campaign of a more personal nature.

The most-vicious, from the left-leaning Daily Kos, contains completely unsubstantiated rumours about her recent pregnancy. Another website questions why Palin, who apparently went into early labour in April during a speech in Texas, chose to fly home to Alaska to deliver her son.

The Anchorage Daily News wrote when her pregnancy was announced at seven months, "That the pregnancy is so advanced it astonished all who heard the news. The governor, a runner who's always been trim, simply doesn't look pregnant."

The Huffington Post, an extremely popular left-wing blog, has devoted nearly its entire website over the past few days to criticizing the Palin pick.

One of its stories quotes Sarah Palin's mother-in-law, Faye Palin, as saying she's not sure which way she will vote.

"I'm not sure what she brings to the ticket other than she's a woman and a conservative," Faye Palin tells The Huffington Post.

Democrats' message conflicted

But while the blogosphere was afire with Palin attacks, the Democrats haven't figured out quite what to do about Palin, only the second woman on a presidential ticket.

There were a few shots across the bow -- Sen. John Kerry called her a member of the "flat-Earth caucus" for her conservative views -- but the Obama campaign has so far tip-toed around Palin.

The Obama camp released a new ad Saturday saying that McCain-Palin is just "more of the same" but doesn't explicitly mention Palin by name.

"Well, he's made his choice," the ad says. "But, for the rest of us there's still no change. McCain doesn't get it, calling this broken economy 'strong.' Wants to keep spending ten-billion-a-month in Iraq. And votes with George Bush 90 percent of the time."

"So, while this may be his running mate . . ." they ad continues, as an image of McCain and Palin appears on the screen, followed by a shot of McCain and U.S. President George Bush embracing, "America knows this is John McCain's agenda. And we can't afford four more years of the same."

Obama and his VP pick, Joe Biden, issued a joint statement saying her selection was "yet another encouraging sign that old barriers are falling in our politics."

However, an earlier statement from an Obama spokesperson on Friday called Palin, "the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience."

Obama later said the contradicting statement was an example of campaign "hair triggers."

"The statement that Joe and I put out reflects our sentiments," he said.