Gore daughters the warm-up act for their parents

By Lauran Neergaard/Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Politics always was a family affair to Al Gore, groomed by his parents for Washington life. Now a third generation of Gores takes up the mantle.

Daughters Karenna and Kristin are chief ambassadors until Gore and wife Tipper arrive at the Democratic National Convention later this week.

One is the family's political heir apparent; the other makes her political debut. The sisters kick off their week of campaigning with a common theme: To get politically blase Generation Xers excited enough about their dad's run to actually vote.

First stop Sunday is an afternoon fixing meals at the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank. The message: Lots of young Americans volunteer to help the poor, the homeless, the environment, all sorts of causes. But even as volunteerism is up, Gen-Xers don't vote as much as older generations -- and the Gore sisters want to remind them that a ballot is powerful.

"Don't be one of those people who complain about politics but do nothing about it," Karenna Gore Schiff wrote in a Newsweek essay last month.

After an afternoon volunteering, the sisters were primed for some fun, at a Hollywood party featuring the popular Goo Goo Dolls Sunday night. Tuesday, they join a voter registration rally thrown by MTV's Choose or Lose.

For Schiff, 27 and a new mother living in New York City, campaigning has become old hat. She was critiquing her father's political speeches in her teens. Now she has become an astute adviser to her dad, who says her instincts have "nearly perfect pitch."

But this week marks the political debut of Kristin Gore, 23, a comedy writer for Fox TV's hip sci-fi cartoon Futurama. Millions will get their first good glimpse of the Gores' second daughter Thursday night, when she introduces her mother on the convention floor.

Gore's two youngest children, still fiercely protected from the public eye, will spend the convention more enjoying themselves than in front of TV cameras. Sarah, 21, is a student at Harvard. Albert III, who at age 6 was hit by a car and almost died, is now a 17-year-old, football-loving high school senior.

Gore was groomed for politics by his late father, Sen. Albert Gore Sr.

But family matriarch Pauline, now 88, may have influenced her son even more, and she will be at his side Thursday as he accepts his party's presidential nomination.

Pauline Gore, one of the first women to graduate from Vanderbilt Law School, taught her son from an early age that men and women are equal. She also introduced her son to environmentalism, his champion cause, and advised him to be a pragmatic politician.

Gore's sister Nancy died at age 46 of lung cancer, an experience that prompted Gore to speak out against smoking. Nancy's husband Frank Hunger remains one of Gore's closest confidants. The Mississippi lawyer accompanies him to the convention.

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