An e-mailer is furious at me because I didn't note here that last Sunday was the anniversary of the day the Batman TV show — the one with Adam West — debuted in 1966. I dunno why he's mad this year. I've ignored it most years in the almost-two-decades I've been doing this blog and he's the first person to flag that as a shameful omission. Besides, he won't like most of what I have to say about it here.

I had and still have very, very mixed feelings about that series. I liked Adam West and Frank Gorshin and Burgess Meredith and Victor Buono and a few other folks seen on it…and I lusted after Yvonne Craig and Julie Newmar. But as a kid who loved comic books and loved Batman even at his worst in those comics, I wrestled with the feeling that the makers of that show didn't; that they thought it was crap worthy only of ridicule. Later on, as I got into their industry myself, I met a number of those makers and found that I'd been right.

Throughout my early life, I often heard from fellow comic book collectors in my age bracket that they had to deal with scorn and condescension for their passion; that they had parents or teachers or colleagues who thought that comic books were trash made for and appreciated only by the mentally-impaired. The only time I recall ever really encountering that attitude was from the people behind the Batman TV show.

In 1966, I was 14 years old — young and naïve enough to even wonder why the folks at DC Comics would allow an outside company to do that to a wonderful (and valuable) property like Batman. I was probably all of 15 when I came to realize that in this world, the answer to the question, "Why would someone do such a thing?" — no matter what that thing is — is almost always "Money." Once in a while, it's "Sex" and/or "Power" and/or "Fame" but usually, it's "Money." Bob Kane, needless to say, was fine with that and because of that teevee show and the attendant merchandising, DC Comics not only sold a lot of DC Comics, they even sold DC Comics the Company.

Even as I was coming to realize that, I still watched the show but I watched it less and less. My opinion descended further and further, especially after I saw the movie based on the series. It was one thing to watch it at home alone and suspect they were ridiculing something I cared about; quite another to sit in a movie theater and hear an audience hooting and laughing at, not with the Caped Crusader.

But I had to watch because of Yvonne and Julie. I would have watched a test pattern if it had Yvonne and/or Julie in it. One of my adolescent fantasies that was partially filled decades later was getting to meet and talk with those ladies. And I also liked — for very different reasons, I assure you — some of the actors I mentioned, especially Burgess Meredith, who, as we all know, played The Penguin.

Around 1980, I got to spend a little time with Mr. Meredith. I don't think I've ever talked about it before but I will in this space tomorrow.

Here's the opening number from one of the most-performed musicals ever written — Fiddler on the Roof. Tevye in this is Anthony Warlow fronting a production done in Australia a few years ago…

Heather Digby Parton reminds us that Donald Trump and his administration are merely carrying on a grand presidential tradition of lying about a war they think we should be in. Trump and his people are just doing a worse job of it than usual.

Heather Digby Parton might well be described as a left-wing pundit. Here, right-wing pundit Rod Dreher says pretty much the same thing.

Up is down, black is white, right is left and Donald Trump is saying that he's making Obamacare better and Democrats are trying to destroy it. Read Jonathan Chait for all the details and while we're at it, here's the Associated Press fact check on the subject.

Why are crazier and crazier actions and claims coming out of the White House? Steve Benen thinks it's because everyone who could talk sense into this president has either quit or been ousted.

And lastly: William Saletan says "In foreign policy — as in morals, trade, criminal justice, fiscal policy, and the rule of law — Republicans have no firm principles. Sometimes they stand for human rights and against tyranny. Sometimes they ignore human rights and defend tyrants. But rain or shine, you can count on Republicans to attack the patriotism of Democrats."

Several of you have written in to ask me the identity of the announcer on all those openings for the TV show Cannon. That was Hank Simms, one of the most-heard voices on TV, radio commercials, movie trailers and anywhere else they wanted a male voice with a "he-man" quality. He was heard on a lot of other TV show openings including Barnaby Jones, The F.B.I. and The Streets of San Francisco. He was also heard in the opening to Police Squad!, where he basically did a parody of Hank Simms. Mr. Simms passed away in 2013 but you can still sometimes hear an announcer trying to approximate a "Hank Simms delivery."

Two or three hours ago, the Internet was awash with obituaries and tributes to the B-Movie actress Julie Strain, including an obit on the website for Hollywood Reporter. Within the hour, friends of hers were posting messages on social media that it was not true, saying that Ms. Strain, who has been quite unwell for some time, had not passed away. Hollywood Reporter and other sites are now retracting their stories.

It's something to keep in mind. In the old days of news reporting — that is to say before the Internet was as developed and expansive as it now is — news stories took many hours to reach all the places where one might read or hear them. Now, it takes like a minute and a half…though the corrections seem to talk a lot longer to reach all their destinations or even get noticed.

Michael Rankins sent me this…

Thanks as always for the brilliant work on your blog, and today especially for posting the Cannon credits video. Did that ever bring back memories!

A question, though, that you with your behind-the-scenes background can probably answer: What merits someone getting "special guest star" status? Watching the Cannon credits, it seems that a lot of the folks who got singled out for this mention weren't necessarily bigger, better-known, or more popular stars than the other actors with whom they shared an episode. So, how did that credit get apportioned? Was it just a matter of someone having a more aggressive agent, or were there other criteria involved?

Once in a while, that kind of billing is dictated by the producers when they land a biggie and want to call a little extra attention to it. There was a point in the seventies when it was known throughout the business that Sammy Davis Jr. was willing to appear on anything (A-N-Y-T-H-I-N-G) for any non-insulting money as long as you treated him like he was a big deal. I would guess he always got Special Guest Star billing.

But probably 80% of the time, it's a case of they offer the actor X dollars, he and/or his reps want Y and they compromise on X dollars plus "Special Guest Star" status. Most famously, the late and lovely Jonathan Harris received "Special Guest Star" billing on every friggin' episode of Lost in Space in lieu of higher pay.

And it isn't always that the agent's aggressive. Sometimes, it's a matter of the producer doing the agent a favor. What happens is that they offer X and that's final. The agent knows that his or her client will accept that rather than lose the job…but the agent also knows that the client will bitch and/or moan that the agent should have gotten more money and maybe hint at finding another agent who can. So the agent says to the producer, "Okay, but can you give me something?"

The producer — and I'm saying "producer" here but it may be a lawyer in Business Affairs or someone else negotiating — knows there's a value in maintaining a friendly relationship with this agent and maybe being owed a favor. So they say, "Okay, tell your client you got them a star dressing room." Or "Tell your client you got them their favorite hairdresser." Or a frequent one is "Tell your client you got them Special Guest Star billing."

Good question, Michael. And I don't know who some of those "Special Guest Stars" on Cannon were, either.

I never would have imagined I'd be quoted in a magazine that describes itself as "The Jesuit Review" or that I would see Comic-Con cited as one of many "glimpses of the kingdom that Jesus imagined, a feast of friendship where all have a seat at the table." But here's an article by a writer named Jim McDermott that accomplishes all that. You could just scroll way down to the part about Comic-Con but take your time and read the entire thing. It might cause you to consider Comic-Con (and some other things) from a different perspective.

By featuring this video, I'm going to do a rotten thing to some of you because it runs 26 minutes and some of you won't be able to resist watching the whole damned thing.

Remember the TV show Cannon? The one that starred William Conrad as a portly detective? It ran five seasons on CBS — from 1971 to 1976. There were 122 episodes and someone with way too much free time spliced together the opening guest star billboards of all 122 episodes. So what you have is a visual catalog of almost every actor or actress who guested on a crime-oriented TV series between the late-sixties and the end of the seventies.

If you were an avid watcher of shows like this and you're anywhere near my age, you'll remember at least 65% of these people…and in some cases, you'll be able to put a name to a face you saw dozens of times. It seemed like some of these folks were day players on every show I watched.

You can even make a drinking game out of this if you like. Take one shot every time you see Martin Sheen, Anthony Zerbe, Marianne McAndrew, Harold Gould, Clu Gulager, Joan Van Ark, Robert Webber, John Vernon or anyone who appeared on their own crime-oriented series or Gilligan's Island. Take two for each Van Patten…

• Just looked at some polls that showed Bernie Sanders gaining. We'll know he has a good shot at the Democratic nomination when Trump starts bribing some foreign government into launching an investigation of him.

Ira B. Matetsky, a longtime reader of this site, recently e-mailed to remind me that years ago, I said I was going to tell this story here and I never did. It's probably not worth the wait but here goes…

This happened in the early-to-mid nineties and I was dating an actress. As I've learned, when you go out with an actress, it's almost impossible to buy her one meal. Wherever you take them, whatever they order, they almost always eat half of it and then take the rest "to go" for the next day. This includes one who was a regular on a hit TV series at the time and probably making a lot more money than me.

It has even been true when I've taken one to a buffet where they don't pack what's left on your plate "to go." In those instances, the actress will get a few extra items from the buffet, wrap them in napkins (or in one case, some Ziploc® bags she'd brought for just this purpose) and slip tomorrow's lunch into their purse. I think this double-dipping may be some sort of requirement if you have a S.A.G. card.

The actress in this story liked red meat and she liked milk so when we went out, we always went someplace where she could get both. Our anecdote takes place at Lawry's, a famous eatery that serves huge slices of prime rib carved tableside. These days when I go there, I order the English Cut, which is the smallest portion and I, like my date if she's an actress, eat half and take the rest home. But this story was a few years before my Gastric Bypass operation so I ordered the largest serving, which was the Diamond Jim Brady cut and I had it with mashed potatoes and creamed corn.

My actress friend ordered the same thing but she, of course, was ordering for two meals. I found on the Internet someone's photo from a Lawry's of the Diamond Jim Brady cut with mashed potatoes and creamed corn. Take a look at it. One of these, at this level of doneness is exactly what was placed before each of us…

Pretty massive, huh? If it looks familiar, you might remember when a similar portion made Fred Flintstone's car tip over.

My friend planned to eat half of hers (if that much) and take the rest home to feed herself for the next week or so. I was thinking of doing that but I ate and ate and pretty soon, there wasn't enough left to take with me. So I was just resting a bit before tackling the last two or three bites on my plate.

She was drinking milk. One thing you need to know about Lawry's is that they have the greatest service in the world. There are always men scurrying about to get you a fresh napkin or a clean fork. When you take a sip from your glass of water, there's a man there in seconds with a pitcher to top it off and replace that sip. My date finished off her second glass of milk and almost instantly, there was someone there to place a third glass of milk before her.

She picked it up and the entire bottom of the glass fell off it, splashing milk all over our table, all over what was left of our dinners, all over us.

This apparently is not that unusual in restaurants. I just Googled the matter and found this on a message board from some time ago…

This happens in restaurants more than you might imagine. The dishwashers in these places are steaming hot and glasses are sometimes grabbed before they can cool and they're filled with cold liquids. This causes the very molecules of the glass to explode in all directions and the bottom of the glass comes off in a clean break.

What happened next happened so fast I couldn't believe it. Four Lawry's bus boys or attendants or whatever you call them were suddenly on us. In a second, they took everything off our table, mopped up the remaining milk, dried the table, put down a new tablecloth and replaced the pepper, the place settings, the little jar of Lawry's Seasoned Salt, everything. And in a flash, they put two brand-new, untouched Diamond Jim Brady cuts of prime rib before us, complete with mashed potatoes and creamed corn.

It was like someone had turned back time to the moment just after we were served and before we dug in. I tried to tell them we didn't (well, I didn't) need an entire new dinner but it was done so fast I couldn't stop it. A few of the nearby diners actually applauded how rapidly they'd removed all traces of the accident. The plates we were staring at each looked exactly like this…

My actress friend was delighted. She now had enough beef to last her the rest of the month so she called for a box. I wasn't about to tuck into this one so I said, "Bring me a box, too." I paid the check — and yes, they just charged for my dinner, her dinner and a lot of milk — and we got up to go. We were just leaving the table with our little doggie boxes when I heard a man at the table opposite us say, "Nice trick there with the milk. I'll have to try that some time."

I hadn't noticed him there before but I recognized him, mostly from his voice. It might make his line more effective if you re-read it with him in mind. It was Jack Nicholson.

Many of you have let me know that the song "Dear Sweet Sewing Machine" was not put back into the show Fiddler on the Roof for its 2015 Broadway revival.  Instead, the two actors who would have sung it if it had been recorded it as a bonus for the cast album and there was a music video shot of them performing it.  I mistyped and said it had been reinserted into the show itself and I have corrected that item.  Thanks to all the correctors.

When Fiddler on the Roof opened on Broadway in 1964, it opened without a song called "Dear, Sweet Sewing Machine" which had been part of it in outta-town tryouts. Someone decided they didn't need it or it wasn't as good as the other songs…or something. When Fiddler got its seven-millionth revival on Broadway in 2015 — okay, okay, it just feels like seven million — that song was recorded for the cast album.

Here's a video of it performed by the character Motel (played by Adam Kantor) and Tzeitel (Alexandra Silber) from that revival. The older man looking on with great pride is Sheldon Harnick, who wrote the lyrics for Fiddler and therefore had great reason to be proud — and also wealthy…

If nothing else, the movie of Cats has triggered a lot of conversation with friends. A few hated it. A few didn't hate it but didn't love it a lot. I'm not sure anyone I discussed it with really liked it though most agreed that it wasn't as bad as some said and that if you went to see a movie based on the musical Cats, the movie you got was exactly the movie you should have expected.

The word "schadenfreude" came up a number of times. Are you familiar with that word? Here's a definition I cribbed off Wikipedia just in case you aren't…

Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure, joy, or self-satisfaction that comes from learning of or witnessing the troubles, failures, or humiliation of another.

There's a famous quote that goes "It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail." If you're curious as to who said it and you search via Google, you'll see it attributed to dozens of different people — enough to assume that we'll probably never know who originated it. Maybe lots of them did independently of one another because it's a pretty obvious observation about human nature.

As the years go by, I less and less like to see schadenfreude and am ashamed that I ever smiled or felt glee at someone's troubles, failures or humiliation.

Now, this doesn't include a few things…like when I feel someone has wronged someone (me, included) and some twist of fate closes down their business or gets them fired or sends them to prison or otherwise means that they can never do that wrong thing again to me or anyone. I think it's okay to be elated by that and sometimes when I predict it and it happens, I'm just plain pleased that I was right.

But as I get older and (I hope, I hope) wiser, I less and less like that sense of delight some display when a certain TV show gets canceled or a certain movie fails — a movie or TV show that never harmed anyone except maybe to take up some of their time with a disappointment or cost them the admission price. (And come to think of it, I may have witnessed more schadenfreude at free screenings than at showings where everyone had to shell out for a ticket.)

Years ago, we did on modem-accessed Newsgroups what we now do on modern-day social media — i.e., debate and discuss. I participated in a number of forums devoted to comic books and animation, plus one about Broadway musicals that was at times waist-deep in schadenfreude. There was a lot of it on the comics 'n' cartoon forums…

…but on the Musicals forum, a show would open, get pasted by the critics, post its closing notice…and you could practically hear the erections of some as they gleefully gloated at their keyboards — and this from people who professed to love musical theatre. Audiences had been unhappy, money had been lost, actors and others were thrown out of work, careers had perhaps been damaged…and these people were so, so happy. It bothered me so much I had to get off that forum.

Read this passage from the book, The Street Where I Live: A Memoir by Alan Jay Lerner. Mr. Lerner is writing about the first out-of-town preview of a show he wrote with Frederick Loewe…

It was the custom in those days for agents, actors and various members of all branches of the theatre to attend out-of-town opening nights to "wish you well," which is theatricalese for "hoping you die." They would all assemble for a quick bite before the curtain in a restaurant called Kaysey's, across the street from the theatre. To illustrate the collective attitude, there was one agent who always arrived for out-of-town openings with scripts under her arm and a flashlight so that she could read during the second act. As I was leaving the restaurant, one of the "dear shits," as they were lovingly known, stopped me and said: "How is it, Alan?" I remember my answer distinctly. I said: "I have no idea what the reaction of the audience will be, but I genuinely believe it's the best musical I ever saw." I realized it was a cruel thing to say but I could not help it. That was how I felt.

The musical, in case you haven't guessed, was My Fair Lady and when it made it to Broadway, it would be one of the biggest hits ever there and a lot of critics would say it was indeed, the best musical they ever saw. But people attended it hoping it would be a disaster because, I guess, if it was a success, it wouldn't be their success.

Speaking of the unimportance of early primaries, here's the other segment that Buck Henry did for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Again, I caution you about the weirdness of Comedy Central video embeds. It might take a while to load and it might be preceded by a commercial of some length. This ran on 9/24/2007.

In an interview, Buck said he enjoyed his two stints on The Daily Show and didn't understand why they didn't call him about doing more. I'm only speculating here but I'd guess that he had little involvement in the writing of them and they felt that, while it was nice to have an older correspondent, flying him in to read (sometimes awkwardly) from a TelePrompter didn't seem to be a great use of him. But there could have been a number of other reasons…

I see all this polling online about the Iowa Caucuses, which are less than a month away. Bernie's up. Bernie's down. Joe's got a lock on it. Joe can't win. Bloomberg's spending like crazy. Have we forgotten that this is not the election? Yeah, the winner sometimes does go on to get his or her party's nomination. Last time out, Hillary did. But the winner in Iowa on the Republican side was Ted Cruz, who didn't come close to his party's nod. The election before that, Rick Santorum won and the time before that, it was Mike Huckabee.

I think we're giving this way too much importance. Today, the polls are within the margin of error for a four-way tie between Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg and Biden. I dunno who'll win. I don't even know who'll be in the lead this time next week. But it does suggest to me that whoever loses won't lose by enough to count them out of the race.

Which reminds me: In 1992, Tom Harkin got 76% and that didn't give him any sort of lock on the nomination. Bill Clinton, who later got it, finished in fourth place with 3%. Why do we care so much about this ritual?