As I trekked to my gate at the Orange County Airport in California not long ago, I stopped briefly at a newsstand to pick up a copy of The New York Times.

The latest decline in hard-nosed, investigative reporting is something called “quote approval.” It began with PR flacks for public officials and political candidates demanding that reporters agree — as a price of being granted an interview — to submit any quotes they intend to use from the interview to the interviewee’s staff for approval.

National brand-name food conglomerates are coming a cropper over California’s Proposition 37. Actually, it’s a double cropper.

This contest in California will likely have a huge impact on national policy and on grassroots efforts to rein in the arrogance of corporate power that’s running roughshod over too many Americans.

One of the curiosities of life in these curious times is that millions of Americans are enjoying the benefits of government — but are either unaware of it or in denial.

Food fight, everyone — let’s all join the fun!

This secretive corporate front is behind hundreds of regressive and repressive bills that’re being pushed through Republican-controlled state legislatures. Its bills and tactics are so venomous that 35 of ALEC’s brand-name corporate funders, from Amazon to Walmart, have withdrawn their names and money this year.

Not only does corporate political money shout, scream, bellow and bay in our elections, but afterwards it quietly slips into the back rooms of power to talk softly about payback.

To check the balance of the scales of justice, look at how the system treats the very rich — and the poor.

“Fracking is perfectly safe,” they insist. “Trust us!” Excuse me, but no.