from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. charlie rose: much talk about the republicans, but the race for the democratic nomination has intensified. senator bernie sanders said hillary clinton's criticism of his stance on gun control and health care signals her campaign is in trouble. he took the lead in new hampshire according to an nbc poll. he is closing the gap in iowa. joining me now is glenn thrush. in washington, peter nicholas.

here in new york, amy chozick at the new york times. i am pleased to have them here as we talk about the democratic race. what is going on? how do we evaluate the sanders surge? amy: the clinton people have said they expected poles to narrow but you have seen a jarring strategic change. she went from barely mentioning bernie sanders to hitting him hard. every signal is they are nervous. they could lose iowa and new hampshire and that could send a ripple effect of losing donors and having to scramble. she could still capture the nomination but they are bracing for that. charlie: does it make her up amy: there are a couple of

schools of thought for the establishment would stick with her. i don't think people necessarily think they would get behind bernie sanders the way they did with barack obama. guest: the thing would look for, the back-to-back defeats in iowa and new hampshire. there is a large african-american vote that is typically loyal to her but defeats and i'll and new hampshire would be troubling for her. it could entice other candidates or politicians to think about the race and could erode the idea that she is the inevitable front runner. charlie: does that include joe biden? guest: i don't think you can rule it out. he regrets having not gotten in. he seems less than enthusiastic about her candidacy. >> it's not good but she has a counter argument she can make. new hampshire is next door to vermont.

sander was supposed to win anyway. iowa is the fifth whitest state in the country and it has a caucus system that is not representative of the larger electorate. she has nevada, a substantial latino population where she is looking strong and south carolina where she will be hard for bernie sanders. i understand there will be a big momentum shift. you can't think of her race in isolation. if donald trump wins any of those first two primaries that changes the fundamental psychology of the average democratic voter and feeds and her argument she is the only one with the strength to fight those guys. i think she will be weekend but she could survive losing both. charlie: is donald trump a powerful threat? it makes even deeper feel the

need to have a strong democratic candidate? >> the same disenchantment with washington politics fueling the donald trump rise is in some sense on the democratic side behind the bernie sanders bounce we have seen. hillary look like she have the nomination sewn up. the strong debate performance. she did very well. the senior democratic electorate, they don't want to just ratify the candidacy. they want to see a contest. they like bernie sanders' message. clinton seems like a mainstream figure that message may not fit the zeitgeist at this moment. charlie: too close to wall street. guest: bought and paid for by wall street is what some suggest. charlie: is there generally a sense the democratic party shifting left? not only in the politics on the campaign trail but in terms of how the president expresses

himself? >> iowa is insurgent candidacy. we have seen the in many elections. the party has shifted to the left and clinton was adjusting her positions as such. i think she needed to sure up union support, to close out joe biden. charlie: and wrap up elizabeth warren. >> exactly. you can see the elizabeth warren wing of the party. the party has moved to the left of where barack obama is on some issues. you look at the transpacific partnership. charlie: you think it is unlikely no matter how well bernie does that she has a firewall and forget all this talk. we are looking for a story.

guest: i don't think we are just looking for a story. first and foremost she has never been a good candidate. we're seeing that again. iowa, i have gone to events. he has a really simple understandable kitsch. hers gets longer and longer. she throws another program on the pile. it is a crazy one our quilt of different programs. you have people nodding off in the audience. she doesn't have a clear message. but she does have this. the main thrust of the party in 2012, it really represented latinos and african-americans. the obama machine maximizing turnout. hillary clinton winning south carolina will be very important and this is a party right now in terms of the base that is far more about those voters than white midwestern voters.

guest: i wonder if hillary clinton is just playing the primaries. because it does signify some weaknesses as a candidate and whether smart have a problem mobilizing voters and spiking turnout in general elections. bernie sanders is a 74-year-old democratic socialist. his name recognition was next to nothing. he is pushing hillary clinton hard in new hampshire and iowa. why is that happening? does that bode well for the democratic party? >> why is that happening? amy: i would say a hard-fought primary could make her a better candidate. by the time she was losing to obama that was the best and we were on the campaign trail together. we saw her become a good candidate. charlie: when it was too late. amy: she started to care less. charlie: is it fair to say that this early hillary clinton did not learn the lessons of 2008?

guest: she learned logistical lessons but she is a more stilted removed and distant candidate than in 2008. in 2008 she had run a senate reelection campaign and was in the mixed with voters, more accustomed to it. i'm seeing some transitional issues from her going from foggy bottom in mason city. she doesn't seem to have the same feel for the electorate she had an later primaries. charlie: do you agree with that? >> i think i do. i do think he has a point here. the just is it is something that is always flummox and her. she is not her husband. she comes off as awkward,

somewhat formal. i was listening to her at a candidate forum in des moines where she was asked about would you deport children who are in the country illegally. her answer was i would provide them due process. we are talking about children. that answer is probably a safe and conventional answer but is it the answer that is memorable? i'm not so sure. amy: she overcorrected some things from 2008. she was criticized for having a campaign filled with old clinton cronies. she fills them with obama people who don't have a relationship with her and cannot push back. charlie: does that include her campaign manager? >> in some cases she overcorrected. >> great point.

the distance between hillary and her brain trust. last time it was too much. she would call people up and scream at them. now you major players who do not communicate with her regularly. that imposes a discipline that wasn't there and gives her a bloodless mechanical quality. but she never talked about being a woman. now she is running as the first grandmother. you see some over correcting and a lot of ways. charlie: what separates the two of them in iowa? not in terms of numbers but in terms of issues. amy: bernie sanders is a visceral income inequality, take back the economy. i she goes through a laundry list of issues like autism, prescription drug prices, micro issues she hears from voters. charlie: joe biden said to me bernie sanders has been making this speech for 30 years.

>> one thing that separates them is authenticity. polish show people don't see her as honest and straightforward. it'll see her as a champion of middle-class interests. i was at an event with bernie sanders. a man got up and talked about $90,000 in student loan debt. half his paycheck goes to student loans. he asked him to stand up and addressed the crowd. he teased out his story. it was a real connection. he turned to the crowd and urge them to vote for bernie. it is not that you see at a clinton rally. charlie: where is bill clinton? guest: we are starting to see him. he is a surrogate for her. he has been in iowa and new hampshire. he sounds nostalgic.

but his speeches have had a meandering quality. he talks about different things he read in the newspaper in his reaction. it is like a walk down memory lane. guest: chelsea clinton, who wouldn't talk to was in 2008, i have this great encounter where she said i don't talk to the press. i said you are all grown up now, why not? a couple of days ago she emerged as a really sharp attack on bernie sanders and his health care plan. that is an interesting thing. back in 2008 i remember hillary having this constellation of surrogates who were willing to go to battle for her.

bernie sanders supporters are supportive of him. -- protective of him. hillary wants these voters. she is trying to woo them. the strategy is tricky. i see why she is doing it. the poll numbers are not looking good but there is possible backlash. amy: peter made the point of authenticity. she is going to look like a typical politician, everything the liberal wing doesn't like about the clintons. >> the recipe for a sanders upset calls for a large turnout of voters under 45 years old and at the lower end of the economic scale appealing to their anger at wall street and the hollowing out of the working class. that is what he has to do. amy: absolutely. the generational gap is stark.

charlie: my impression was what she had done between 2008 and 2015 is put together a group of people who knew how to reach those voters. amy: i candidate is a candidate. decades long and the public i can't change that. young people don't see her as new and fresh. i did a lot of reporting about young women not owing so excited about the first female president. 6001 who are excited about hillary and breaking the glass ceiling. the people are not motivated by that. it's an interesting dynamic. >> it is striking. i was at an event at iowa state university and there was a young mother with a baby and the baby cried. people didn't know what it was.

there is not a lot of young people at the rallies. 75, 80% of folks are over 60 years old and some are in their 90's. charlie: the donald trump phenomenon. is that a pervasive, dominant theme of this campaign or is it just the republican campaign because you have people in that party who are tired of not only democrats, not only the establishment in washington but their own party establishment? >> interesting data i have seen is the overlap between donald trump supporters and bernie sanders supporters. there is a white working-class contingent that is supportive of both. there are issues that are motivating voters to be drawn to both candidates on opposite sides of the spectrum. this anger is more widespread than just dismissing it as republican primary voters. it is a problem for hillary. some say she is not going to win the angry though. she can win over democrats.

the very angry voters are not her strong suit. charlie: is elizabeth worn on the campaign trail adult russian mark >> i don't think she has endorsed. >> she wants to determine who the person now are in the administration. she wants a say in the financial monitors in that administration. charlie: does bernie sanders have a ground game? guest: he does. hillary folks got through it quickly. sanders has an enormous amount of enthusiasm and he has a lot of money. a lot of places i've talked to, as late as the early fall they were not seeing a big presence from sanders. now his family got door knocked the other day.

he sanders folks are coming on strong. does it beat enthusiasm? i would take enthusiasm over organization any day. charlie: but that is exactly not true in the republican party. ted cruz may win because of organization, not enthusiasm. >> you are dealing about the difference in a dynamic between the democratic side and the caucus and the republican side and the caucus. , both sanders and clinton have considerably more sophisticated and expensive ground operations than exist on the republican side. he does anything compared to the massive, hundreds of staffers on the ground in iowa.

charlie: february 1 is around the corner. february 8 is around that corner. if you had to predict today, does bernie sanders when iowa? >> it is hard to predict. we have all been burned. he has a good chance to win iowa and new hampshire. if he does that is an embarrassment to hillary clinton. it scrambles the race. it forces her to spend more money than she wants to. i don't think you can roll up the possibility of a bernie sanders upset win in iowa. who would have predicted this in may? or october when joe biden announced he wasn't running. charlie: it gives momentum for sure.

guest: if i were to guess right now, i would say he will take both of them. i think the clinton people expected a sanders surge. contrary to what clinton said. they expected a much later surge. three weeks out they were not expecting a surge. she does need to do something to stop sanders. >> i don't think anyone predicted she would come in third in 2008. not going to predict either. bernie could win both early states. it's a possibility. it is hard to see, she is throwing things against the wall and seeing what sticks. it doesn't look a real strategy for taking on bernie. it was guns, then his single-payer health care proposals. i haven't seen a solidified message that is going to resonate without turning off his supporters.

>> what is interesting is his socialist ties. we haven't seen that at all. there is a record where he has said things about government ownership of the means of production. he wrote in 1976 he talked about that. it will be interesting to see if they feel threatened enough they would start calling attention to the fact he is an avowed socialist. >> that would call into question his support of president obama. obama is widely popular around primary voters. if sanders hasn't been supportive of him, she thinks that is a winning bet. charlie: great to see you. thank you so much. we'll be right back. stay with us. ♪

charlie: stevie guitar miller is here. he has written some of the most successful and memorable songs. the joker, fly like an eagle. certified 16 times platinum. rolling stone calls him a pop rock chip maker who combines indelible rifts, catchy tunes and danceable grooves into songs that light up the brock radio. he will be inducted into the rock 'n roll hall of fame in

april. here he is playing the joker. ♪ >> ♪ some people call me the space cowboy some people call me the gangster of love some people call me maurice people talk about me they say i'm doing wrong doing you wrong don't you worry darling i'm right here. i'm a picker, i'm a grinner i'm a joker, i'm a smoker, i'm a midnight toker you are the cutest thing i ever did see you love your peaches i want to shake your tree lovely, lovely all the time maybe i could show you a good time

i'm a picker, i'm a grinner, i'm a lover i'm a sinner i'm a joker i'm a smoker i'm a midnight toker yeah ♪ i'm a picker, i'm a grinner, i'm a lover

i'm a sinner playing my music in the sun i'm a joker, i'm a smoker, i'm a midnight toker i give my loving on the run i'm a picker, i'm a grinner, i'm a lover, i'm a sinner playing my music in the sun i'm a joker, i'm a smoker, i'm a midnight toker ♪ ♪

i'm a picker, i'm a grinner, i'm a lover i'm a sinner playing my music in the sun i'm a joker, i'm a smoker, i'm a midnight toker i give my loving on the run i'm a picker, i'm a grinner, i'm a lover, i'm a sinner playing my music in the sun i'm a joker, i'm a smoker, i'm a midnight toker ♪ ♪

charlie: i am pleased to have steve miller here for the first time. steve: it's an honor to be here. you are my favorite interviewer. charlie: how does it feel to be inducted into the hall of fame. >> it feels pretty good. a lot of excitement, it's a surprise. they said people are voting for you. you are in this thing. people are talking about you. to be, to walk again to the hall of fame with my godfather les paul, and chuck berry, people like that i have played with and no, that feels great.

charlie: les paul played a big role? steve: he's my godfather. he was the first entertainer i ever saw. he taught me how to jam, he taught me about music, about musicians. it was always funny. i saw him when i was 4.5 years old. i saw a great guitarist and he saw him and put his over his left hand and continued playing so he couldn't steal his lyrics -- licks. he was very encouraging.

he listened to my -- my father made some tapes of me when i was four years old making up songs and singing to kids in the back alley. i was doing a show and he recorded me. he played it for les paul. i was embarrassed. i was going to go places, i was going to have fun. it was 1949. charlie: did you know you wanted to be a musician? steve: i did. a came from a musical family. lots of great musicians were coming to the house. people like that were hanging out and partying. that look like a lot of fun to me. les paul and mary, my mom and dad were the best men and maid of honor at the wedding and spent their honeymoon night at the house. i just -- he taught me my first chords. mary was doing multitrack recording with her voice.

charlie: this is les paul in 1991. the year we started. les paul: steely, that first time where you do it, brand-new, the best. if you can get through it, probably everything after that will be more perfect, better but not with the same feeling. charlie: not the same humanity. whose voice would you like to have had? les paul: anyone but the one i've got. [laughter]

charlie: that's him. steve: that is les. he lived to be 93 years old. he was working right up to the end. the last time, i thought he was going to live to be 120 years old. charlie: you'll be admitted as steve miller, not the band. steve: i think that so much time has passed, if we had been put up for nomination, when we were originally together, the whole band would have gotten in. guys like that are such important parts of my work and my life. i would like to bring them all in. there is a lot of people, it has been 50 years we have been doing this.

charlie: 40 years since the joker. steve: yeah. it goes by fast. charlie: you are telling me. steve: you have a lot of work to do. charlie: how high up do you put that? steve: that album, the joker was a song that saved my career. it was my seventh album with capitol records. they didn't care about what i was doing at all. and, i made the record in a couple of weeks. i turned it in and did a 60 city the last thing i said, try and have some albums in the stores in the cities that i'm actually working. it was always that kind of a fight. i went out and it was like a viral thing. trying to make singles.

that gave me the finances to improve my sound system. charlie: and it give you confidence. steve: yeah, and a bigger audience. i went from the joker to playing the fillmore auditorium, to playing a paramount in the fox theater, to playing arenas and football stadiums in two years. there is a lot of development that had to happen. charlie: when you write songs, you have to have a lot of confidence. >> i don't think so. when i would write songs i always wanted to hear the harmony. i love four-part harmony. i walk around hearing things in

four-part harmony all the time. i want to sing the second part or the lower part. i was writing songs to get harmony points i could sing. i never felt like i was a brilliant songwriter. i felt like i knew how to make singles. i felt like i knew how to produce records. i really like that part of the game. i listen to those records per you go back and listen to the record he cut in 1954 and it sounds great today. les paul was a genius at that. they sounded like they were recorded this morning. there was a big fight in the studio. the studio didn't like the way we worked. they didn't like who we were. we were regular musicians. we were from san francisco. we were in a fight. we started recording left, and went to london to the limbic studios where they liked us and wanted to make the drums sound bigger. you and make a record and it sounded like this tiny thing,

especially rock 'n roll. electric guitars. you have to then use these tracts to turn it into a big thing that would sound good. then he would go and cut the vinyl. there would be a guy there who would be 58 years old, who was going to keep the needle down here. you want it up here. all the energy and presence is on the edge. it is right up there. that is the first thing. it has to sound great. then once it sounds great you can start singing and doing the harmonies. i think it had five hooks. charlie: five hooks?

steve: that is my formula. charlie: tell us about a hook. steve: it's been on three seconds, and you go hey. then something else happens and all of a sudden you understand what is going on. now you have 2, 3 going on. somebody singing something you want to sing along with. something happens. the next thing you know, it's different and fun. most of my songs are kind of like songs you would put in the car and drive. from texas to illinois and listen to the music. ♪

charlie: the joker took in a while to get it. steve: yeah. it was the first time i was on a.m. radio.

that was always the goal very to get on a.m. radio which was tough. it was like a mafia controlled thing. i didn't like that part of it. i didn't like the payola part and the disc jockeys that wanted to to do free things. there were problems with the way the business work. when i got the joker, i didn't have those problems anymore. later, i learned a lesson from the independent promoters who came back in the business later. i put out an album and had some guys say listen, for $60,000 we can get this plate in los angeles. i just had a number one record. i'm not paying $60,000 to anybody. are you not? my next record sold 25,000 records. charlie: what did that tell you? steve: there were some people in town controlling the airplay and if you wanted airplay you had to

pay for it. i decided to take a break and left. i learned to navigate and run radar. i started cruising from seattle to alaska. i am so glad i did that. charlie: do you still write songs? steve: not so much. i think it is because the songs that i wrote were like pop hits for young kids, for young people. i write a lot of music but the business is different. charlie: tutoring is everything. steve: i do a lot of blue tours. in my show, 23 songs or something. 14 our greatest hits that people are disappointed -- but he didn't do jungle love. i never want anyone to feel that way. there are nine songs i can weave

in and out. if i say to my audience, hey, here's a couple of new songs, we just made a new record. 5000 people go get a hot dog and want come back until they hear the joker start. it is very conservative. charlie: take a look at this. this is mick jagger talking about the expectation to perform hit songs. >> you get the feeling like -- there is a certain audience that comes to an event. you go to a baseball game, you want to see the star batter hit the ball. you have to do a great six tunes that everyone knows. i like them. i can bring things to them. i can do sympathy for the devil. i can do that every other night. charlie: every other night.

steve: i've had more fun playing my greatest hits than i have in a long time. i've been hanging out the lincoln center. i need to practice, i need to play some scales. i need to get better. by osmosis, i am playing better in my approach. i moved to new york a couple of years ago for this reason. getting so inspired by all of the music and talent and art i am seeing, it is making me step up. my band started playing better. i started having a better time with my audience. we just had a run that we just finished that was so much fun. it is a whole new thing.

i think you have to keep getting better. you can't get to where i have these 23 songs that i do and i make a great living doing it. next week i'm going to do them again. for me, i spent three hours practicing. i brought out my guitar and i was practicing. for a long time i wasn't doing that. charlie: do you feel better about it? steve: i feel so much better i can't tell you. music on the stages like -- i didn't know we could play rocking me like that. >> it is different. the audience changes every couple of years. my audiences something. it ranges from six years old or 10 years old to 80 now. i have watched it all my life. in the 1990's it was all kids. people would say your audience is so young.

when we scoped it out it was like between the ages of 10 years old and 25 years old. it was 60% girls. these were 20,000 kids coming in. there was this whole audience created to. there is this 1960's audience. you get these overlaps where you play. you look out and it is pretty cool. a lot of kids and old people, the main thing is they love music. they like music and they love live performance. they are my audience and i have had this deal with them all my life.

we are going to play good. we are going to sing well. this is going to be a good show. charlie: this is you performing fly like an eagle at austin city limits in 2011, five years ago. >> ♪ time keeps on slipping into the future time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future ♪

charlie: of all the things you have done, does one stand out in terms of not just your favorite song, but one that has more meaning, because of what it said to you? steve: fly like an eagle is my song. that is the important song. musically it is original. i like what it says and what it is about. i like the politics of it. i like the way it snuck in and took over and has lasted.

the main thing is it has this huge section that is spontaneous and you don't know what's going to happen. every night when we jump into that pool, it is different and satisfying. charlie: you said your goal was to make a record that when radio stations put it on site could not take it off. [laughter] steve: that's true. i used to listen the bozo records. you would turn the page. they were albums. records were stories, they went on and on. iowa is thought an album -- i always thought an album should be something you put on and you can't take off. it's really good. so those records had said ways in between -- had segues between the stories. i started making musical segues. they didn't, they played the whole side. for months they played the whole

side. they would flip it over and play the other side. i pulled it off, i did it. i wanted every song to be a hit. every song to be important. i wanted the album to be a great piece of music. i listen to a lot of jazz. a lot of modern jazz. a lot of miles davis. those records were you put them on and they take you to a beautiful place. i wanted to do that with my songs. charlie: it's hard to put out an album today unless you are a steve: this is a different world.

charlie: how long do you want to tour? steve: for my entire life. i'm having so much fun. i get up every day. that is a lot of fun. like i said, i have watched you for 23 years. i know who you are and how you operate, i know where you are going. i really love it. i worked at the university of miami, worked with helping develop music programs. all of that is fun. i have a lot of experience and ideas. very opinionated. what i want to do is take these kids and teach them how to make money playing music. i want them to know how to do a show and entertaining audience, and get on a stage and turn it

on and start something, and creed in front of the people and have that filled the room. that is the magic. charlie: most can never imagine what it is like to walk when the lights are dark and you are in a stadium, and you walk on. steve: it is so much fun. steve: i used to wonder. i would watch les paul when i was little kid. that looks like so much fun. and then i got on stage, and there were times i was scared. times i would be shaking. then i finally got used to it. it is really odd. i love to play for an audience. now i really like my audience.

i want to sit down and talk to them, i want to tell them some stories. the bigger it is the better it is. charlie: what are you doing with jazz? steve: i'm on the board. nine helping develop a pedagogy for early american music, for appalachian music. for delta blues. texas blues, missouri blues. chicago blues. we're going to fix it so we can teach it. i am curating shows for their different rooms. i have jimmy vaughn coming in in april. we are putting together a show

trying to get jazz at lincoln center to grab young kids and create these jazz bands. i want to see while davis junior. eric clapton can copy freddie king, become eric clapton, i want to see some jazz fans. i want to see something like cannonball or coal train. i want to have the orchestra doing that. i want to bring up the groups and have them steal the show. i want them to start jazz festivals all over the world. that is my plan for those guys. charlie: you really are a producer. look at this.

steve miller band the joker. steve miller band greatest hits. you were in san francisco with the grateful dead. steve: i was. i got to san francisco when it was starting. it was great. it was absolutely amazing. it was so different. i came from chicago. i've been competing with muddy waters four gigs and nightclubs. i got out to san francisco in the grateful dead hit the stage and played a bad version of in the midnight hour and stood around tuning for 20 minutes. what is this? i wanted to be in it because i wanted to get out of the nightclubs and it held 1200 people. you make $500 a night. i started looking at what was going on and they were a social

phenomenon. the whole world changed. san francisco is this magic place. now it is silicon valley. you look at the last 50 years, it never stops. it is changing the whole world. there is energy and synergy there. it was there in the 1960's. it was incredible. there were all these kids there. some were good musicians. some were just guys who said we are going to start a rock band and do this. we went from the filmore to football stadiums. thank you. it's been a pleasure. charlie: the induction into the rock 'n roll hall of fame will

be taking place april 8. thank you for joining us. see you next time. ♪

it is new here in hong kong. china's credit growth jumped to $276 billion. they may turn to alternative sources for funds. beijing is struggling to reign in the debt market that has belonged to $20 trillion. rising to the highest level ever.