Also there is no evidence yet that Paladin will only use Sword & Shield.

That may be true, but this has not been said. It has only been said that Gladiator unlocks Paladin, not that you can't use it on other classes. I'd like to be a mage/Paladin personally, or a Gladiator/Thief but who knows in the end what it will really be until they give us more info or hands-on experience with the new job system. (Good luck with that, though).

It just furthers that SE needs to be more transparent with what they know to be true and less cryptic and mysterious to fuel these rampant speculation (aka waste of time) threads. They won't any time soon, though, so rampant speculate away my friends because heaven knows there isn't enough to do in the actual game to keep you busy and off the forums. That's the true tragedy.