US Elections: New Questions Over Mccain's Choice of Running Mate

Sarah Palin yesterday came face-to-face with the hard reality of the media examination she will undergo as John McCain's running mate when she was forced to confirm that her unmarried school-age daughter was pregnant.

The revelation immediately renewed questions about the extent to which Palin, Alaska's governor, and relatively unknown before McCain announced her as his vice-presidential choice on Friday, had been vetted.

Palin, the vice-presidential candidate and new star of the Republican party, was in St Paul, Minnesota, yesterday to rally Republican convention delegates after being dispatched by McCain the previous night. The Republicans are trying to salvage their convention, which has been disrupted by media attention switching to Hurricane Gustav. All convention activities had been canceled for Monday except for essential business.

Palin, soon after her arrival, was caught up in questions about her private life. In response, the McCain campaign team issued a statement on her behalf stating that her 17-year-old unmarried daughter, Bristol, was five months pregnant. Palin, who campaigns on a Christian, anti-abortion ticket, said Bristol and her partner planned to marry: "We're proud of Bristol's decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents."

The fact that her daughter is to marry and have the baby may blunt any negative reaction among the party's social conservatives worried about sex before marriage. The news could even help consolidate the image of Palin and her family as typical of the average American home.

The emergence of details about Palin's life, partly after reporters landed at her home town, Wasilla, in Alaska, raised concerns about whether the usual vetting had been dispensed with due to McCain's impulsive choice.

McCain's team insisted yesterday he had known about the pregnancy before offering Palin the job. A spokesman, Steve Schmidt, said the senator's view was that this was "a private family matter".

Mark Salter, a McCain adviser, said the pregnancy had been announced to rebut rumors from internet bloggers that Palin's son, Trig, born in April with Down's syndrome, was a child of Bristol's.

The appointment of Palin is intended to mark a change in strategy by McCain. Having concluded it was not enough to challenge Barack Obama over his lack of foreign experience and to push his own narrative as a Vietnam war hero, he has been hoping to appeal to the working class and lower middle class, and believes Palin has the right credentials for attracting blue-collar workers.

With the absence from the convention of McCain and the US president, George Bush - who had been scheduled to make a prime-time speech last night at the convention but went instead to Texas to be on hand for the Hurricane Gustav emergency center - Palin, Laura Bush and McCain's wife, Cindy, led the push to raise delegates' spirits.

The president's wife, who was scheduled to appeal from the podium for help for hurricane victims rather than make a politically-tinged speech, acknowledged delegates' frustration over the canceled first day of the four-day convention. "I know they're disappointed they're not going to get to have the program tonight, but everyone understands it, everyone is thinking about everybody all across the Gulf coast," she told CBS television.

All but two hours of the conference were canceled yesterday. A cocktail party planned for last night, named Spirits of Minneapolis, was renamed Spirits of the Gulf Coast and turned into a fundraiser event for the American Red Cross Hurricane Relief Fund.

The Republicans are hoping to resume normal business today or at least tomorrow. As long as they can manage to have two full days of prime-time viewing, finishing as planned on Thursday night, they believe they can secure enough media attention to judge the convention a success.

While Hurricane Gustav reminded the public of the failure of Bush to deal with the devastation of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, McCain's campaign team sought to turn the storm to their advantage. The cancellation of the first day of the convention sent out a message that McCain cared, contrasting with Bush's seeming indifference straight after Hurricane Katrina.

McCain said on ABC News that he was frustrated at the loss of part of the convention but added: "This is just one of those moments in history where you have to put America first."

The hurricane diverted media attention from the Republican convention, with almost all of the anchor journalists from the main networks having flown out to New Orleans.McCain is hoping he can get back media attention for Palin's speech tomorrow and his own on Thursday. Rick Davis, a McCain adviser, said decisions would be taken on a day-to day-basis.