There’s tarnish on those golden arches.

“Wall Street Week” this past Friday night on television disclosed stock earnings were down for McDonald’s because the fast-food giant couldn’t continue to grow; seems its market is saturated.

And speaking of growth – and saturation – McDonald’s also faces a class-action lawsuit alleging that the company is responsible for obesity in youngsters, who unfortunately have no problem growing due to the saturated-or-otherwise fat in McDonald’s products.

Hold on. Here’s an American icon being targeted because a 12-year-old boy eats too many Big Macs, gets fat and now the lawyers – acting out a scenario described in John Grisham’s latest novel, “King of Torts” – dig in their chops.

It’s not a question of “where’s the beef?” but what’s the beef?

So there is a population of overweight adolescents out there, whoppers, if you will, who stuff down fries and burgers without being told the calorie content. Apparently, the class-action plaintiffs will be satisfied if McDonald’s will merely post its calorie counts for each item, making “happy meals” for everyone involved.

Yet these same hefty kids can feast on Greek pizzas with fattening feta cheese or chicken salad with bistro-oily dressings and consider themselves healthy eaters. It’s the fast-food places taking the rap, and I don’t think that’s one bit fair. Next probably will be Kentucky Fried Chicken or, heaven forbid, Krispy Kreme.

Nobody can convince me McDonald’s is the culprit, the cause of obesity in today’s eater-outers. I grew up on fried fish, fried pork chops, fried okra, and every Sunday dinner of my childhood, chicken fried in a black iron skillet. In addition, ham hocks or salt pork was added to every mess of turnip greens or field peas ever slow-cooked in our household; and homemade mayonnaise topped off every bowl of summer tomatoes.

Soul food, not health food, was what I was raised on, and I wasn’t so heavy I couldn’t climb up into the treehouse. In fact, I must have played off all those calories from cornbread or cobbler, chasing around the neighborhood day and night and never sitting still except during dreaded piano lessons.

My childhood was spent kicking-the-can, roller skating, riding bikes, jumping rope, playing hopscotch, swinging in tires, dodging balls and hiding and seeking. It was not spent watching television or playing computer games.

McDonald’s isn’t to blame for overweight youngsters. Inactivity is. And I may not be able to polish off the tarnish from their golden arches, but I sure can one of their sausage biscuits.