Bolivia's Long March Against Evo Morales: An Indigenous Protest

A protester walks toward La Paz, Bolivia, part of a march by indigenous groups to protest a government planned highway that would cut through the Isiboro-Secure Indigenous Territory National Park, home to 15,000 indigenous people.

Juan Justiniano and 700 other indigenous men, women and children have been marching more than nine weeks from their home in Bolivia's Amazon basin, headed for the capital, La Paz. They're protesting plans for a highway that would dissect their lands, and they've faced scorching sun, driving rain and police brutality along their 375-mile (603 km) trek. But what pains them more is knowing that the man they call their antagonist — President Evo Morales, an Aymara Indian — is Bolivia's first indigenous head of state. "It's unfortunate," says Justiniano, 26, a Moxeño Indian, breathing hard as he strides through the Yungas Valley north of La Paz, "that a supposedly indigenous government is forcing a project that will ruin our home."

Though their numbers are relatively small and their sandaled feet blistered, Justiniano and his cohort have ruined the southern-hemisphere spring for Morales. In fact, their main grievance — Morales' proposed highway through their pristine Amazon territory, a protected reserve that's home to 11 endangered animal species and three ethnic groups battling extinction — has sparked one of the most serious challenges yet to the leftist President's five-year rule. Amid images of hundreds of Bolivian police beating indigenous marchers — many carrying symbolic bows and arrows — taping women's mouths and spraying even children with tear gas, says Karen Hooper, an analyst for the private, Texas-based intelligence agency Stratfor, "the stage is set for a period of real turmoil."

And it's a stage Morales hardly expected to face. His usual foes are Bolivia's white, conservative economic elite in the east, whose stratagems he's almost always overcome while emerging politically stronger. But he has rarely if ever been confronted by a mass movement demanding he live up to his own indigenous and environmental ideals. Morales is one of the most vocal heads of state pushing industrialized nations to take steps to curb climate change; Bolivia last year even drafted the U.N.'s historic Right to Water resolution. (See why Bolivia's Cerro Rico Mountain is collapsing.)

Yet when it comes to domestic policy, critics says Morales has been inconsistent if not hypocritical. He has unabashedly expanded mining and other extractive industries in the name of both growing the economy and funding popular social programs in South America's poorest country. His government often prioritizes energy and infrastructure projects over preservation of precious eco-systems like the indigenous territory of north-central Bolivia known by its Spanish acronym TIPNIS — a vital link between the Andes and the Amazon that environmentalists fear could be overwhelmed by mass agriculture, logging, oil exploration (there are known reserves there) and pollution if Morales' proposed highway is allowed to cut through it.

Even so, the issue was barely on the national radar screen until mid-August, when TIPNIS residents like Justiniano began their long march on La Paz. Six weeks later, it became an international cause celebre when some 500 police officers began converging on them. "We had to run into the forest to escape," one of the marchers, Matilda Vargas, told TIME. Most of Bolivia recoiled. Morales' Defense Minister, Cecilia Chacón, resigned in protest and demonstrations against the repression paralyzed the country for days. Morales' approval ratings plunged into the 30s. He moved quickly to repair the damage, denying he gave the order for police intervention, publicly apologizing to the victims and their families and rushing through legislation suspending the highway's construction until TIPNIS residents can be consulted on the project.

But it seemed too little too late. "We will accept nothing less than the cancellation of the highway," says Fernando Vargas, head of the TIPNIS community association. Vargas says the group is not opposed to a road linking economically important Beni and Cochabamba states, but he insists it can't tear through the heart of the reserve. "The government has refused to consider all the alternative proposals," he adds. The government in turn says it hasn't received "viable" alternatives, but it hasn't explained why it thinks other plans aren't workable. (See Bolivia's not-so-green record.)

Either way, Morales' recalcitrance in the face of a political avalanche is baffling. The marchers believe the President is appeasing his principal base, the coca growers of the Chapare region that borders the reserve. For years, cocaleros have encroached on reserve land, and residents fear the highway will let the growers expand their plantations more easily.

Morales argues the road is meant to modernize an impoverished nation that desperately needs development. But Silvia Molina, a researcher with the Bolivian Environmental Forum, says, "The government has never given details as to what vital benefits this road offers that could outweigh the environmental and social costs." Molina, like other skeptics, also wonders aloud about Brazilian interests: 80% of the $332 million highway, which could serve as a key route for moving Brazilian goods to Pacific ports, is being financed by Brazilian development bank BNDES and is being built by the Brazilian construction firm OAS. La Paz and Brasília deny such motives.

To the contrary, Morales claims — as he is wont to do — that TIPNIS protesters are part of a destabilization plot against his government. In August, Morales produced phone records of calls between march leaders and a U.S. embassy employee. Since then, the list of supposed provocateurs has grown to include foreign NGOs and opposition party politicians. While there is little evidence of a conspiracy, Bolivia's right wing does appear to be licking its chops as Morales takes blows from erstwhile allies. Opposition pols — hardly the friends of folks like TIPNIS residents — are suddenly attending marches and making pleas for "indigenous rights." The country's largely opposition media has made the TIPNIS uprising front-page news, depicting the marchers as heroes. "When I protested like this they called me a terrorist," Morales said reprovingly. (See photos of lithium wealth beneath the salt flats.)

Morales' supporters are convinced of a right-wing conspiracy as well. They held a large pro-government rally in the capital last week, and it was well attended by Bolivia's highland indigenous. But TIPNIS' lowland indigenous say they're not looking for a civil war. "We want to sit down and talk with Evo, not bring down his government," says Justiniano, a farmer and fisherman, expressing his own frustration that Morales' conservative foes are exploiting the TIPNIS protests. Still, he says their bows and arrows may not remain so symbolic if Morales pushes ahead with his highway and residents have to "defend" their preserve.

They still have to make it to La Paz, however — not an easy task on foot for Amazon denizens who've rarely if ever experienced the capital's altitude of 12,000 feet (3,800 m). And with the physical test comes an emotional one: "In 2005, I marched in support of Evo Morales with this flag," says TIPNIS resident and Chiquitano Indian Fernando Garos, 30, holding up a tattered Bolivian banner. "My heart is heavy because today I carry this same flag as I march against him."

Research support was provided by The Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute.

See photos of fighting during Bolivia's Tinku.

See if Bolivia can harvest its forests sustainably.

Inside the Numbers: Why Romney Would Outperform Perry Against Obama

Inside the Numbers: Why Romney Outperforms Perry Against Obama | Swampland | TIME.com /* */ Home TIME Magazine Photos Videos Specials Topics Subscribe Mobile AppsNewslettersRSS @TIME NewsFeed U.S. Politics World Business Money Tech Health Science Entertainment Opinion SEARCH TIME.COM Full Archive Covers Videos 2012 ElectionDebatesDemocratic PartyPollsRepublican PartyMichele BachmannMitt RomneyRick PerryWhite HouseBarack ObamaJoe BidenCongressBudgetsHouseSenateLobbyingJohn BoehnerMitch McConnellNancy PelosiHarry ReidDomestic PolicyAbortionAgricultureDebtEconomyEducationHealth CareHousingForeign PolicyAfghanistanChinaDiplomacyHillary ClintonIranIraqPhotosSpecialsVideos PollsInside the Numbers: Why Romney Outperforms Perry Against ObamaBy Alex Altman | @aaltman82 | October 14, 2011 | View CommentsTweetTristan Spinski / CorbisRepublican presidential candidates Rick Perry, left, and Mitt Romney, applaud during the Fox News/Google GOP Debate in Orlando, Fla., Sept. 22, 2011.

After weeks of shaky debates and swirling questions about his record in Texas, it’s no surprise that Rick Perry is running behind Mitt Romney in head-to-head general election matchups against Barack Obama. Perry lags 12 points behind Obama, 50% to 38%, in TIME’s new poll, while Romney trails the President by a 46% to 43% margin, within the margin of error in most polls. Thirteen months before the election, the utility of horserace figures is limited. Still, the poll captures a useful snapshot how Perry’s support has softened even among the conservative blocs that seemed poised to rally behind his candidacy.

There are two areas in particular that should give immediate pause to Republicans looking ahead to a general-election tussle. For one, Romney is far better position to vie for the independent voters who help swing tight battles. He leads Obama among self-identified independent likely voters, 45% to 42%. Obama, by contrast, has a 47% to 39% edge over Perry in the fight for the same group.

The second area where the former Massachusetts governor boasts an edge is in the Midwest, home to an industrial corridor where the shrinking manufacturing base and sluggish recovery has dragged down Obama’s support. The ability to retake states like Ohio and Indiana would be a critical boost to the Republican nominee’s prospects, and Romney, who hails from Michigan — the state his father ran for a stretch — is in better position right now to accomplish that feat. Romney leads Obama in the Midwest by seven points, 46% to 39%. Perry trails the President in the region by the same margin.

But Perry’s most alarming area of under-performance is among evangelicals, a conservative faction squarely in Perry’s wheelhouse. This is a governor whose revival rally filled a Houston football stadium, who courts conservative bigwigs in language that reveals a Biblical fluency. Less than a week ago, a Perry supporter sparked a kerfuffle by suggesting that Romney, a Mormon, would not appeal to Evangelicals on the hunt for a true Christian candidate rather than an adherent to a “cult.” And yet in TIME’s poll, Romney outperforms Perry among Evangelicals, leading Obama 51% to 39%. Perry leads Obama among Evangelicals as well, but by a slimmer 46% to 40% margin. That head-to-head deficit in a prime Perry demographic may underscore the degree to which his faltering performance has sowed doubts among potential supporters.

The poll, conducted for TIME by Abt SRBI, surveyed 1,001 voters on Oct. 9-10.

Related Topics: 2012, evangelicals, gop, independents, midwest, mitt romney, rick perry, Polls
emailprintshareLinkedInStumbleUponRedditDiggMixxDel.i.ciousWriteView Comments@TIMEPoliticsLatest on SwamplandMust Reads | October 14, 2011Morning Must Reads: BurdenBoehner orders up infrastructure, aviation and trade bills. Het gets prickly with Obama on jobs.The White House weighs a plan to woo private firms into a bigger role in housing finance.Romney continues Sino saber-rattling on trade.From our PartnersJimmy Carter: 'I'm Optimistic' Obama Will Win 2012Huffington PostFive Questions for President ObamaPoliticoMichele Bachmann: Rick Perry Rewarded Donors With State MoneyHuffington PostArticles of Faith | October 14, 2011Will Evangelicals Doom Romney?

Mitt Romney can’t seem to broaden his appeal beyond a quarter of the Republican electorate. Despite his commanding debate performances and general election promise, his support in primary polls has rarely surpassed 26%, which is close to where he peaked in 2008. He does not pick up new backers when support for opponents like Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann fades. What’s going on? It’s the evangelicals, stupid.

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French Prosecutors Drop Attempted Rape Charge Against Strauss-Kahn

Former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn arrives to a polling station for the Socialist party's (PS) 2011 primary vote for France's 2012 presidential election on October 9, 2011 in Sarcelles, northern suburb of Paris. (Photo: Miguel Medina / AFP / Getty Images)

The legal proceedings against Dominique Strauss-Kahn for sexual assault and attempted rape continued thinning out Thursday, as French prosecutors dropped their inquiry into charges the former International Monetary Fund chief attacked French author Tristane Banon during a 2003 meeting. But that decision by French justice officials—coming less than two months after New York prosecutors withdrew their criminal case for attempted rape against Strauss-Kahn—didn't carry the resounding refutation of Banon's sexual assault charges that DSK had earlier predicted. Instead, the French public prosecutor said Thursday that while insufficient evidence was found to substantiate attempted rape, “acts that could be qualified as sexual aggression were established.” Unlike the attempted rape charge—which carries a statute of limitations of 10 years—sexual assault offenses can only be prosecuted three years after they were committed, which led authorities to formally file Banon's case.

The move means that—for now—the only pending legal action against Strauss-Kahn is a civil suit for sexual assault filed in the Bronx by DSK's New York accuser Nafissatou Diallo. DSK's American attorneys are seeking dismissal of that litigation with arguments their client's IMF job at the time of the alleged attack provided him diplomatic immunity from civil suits. While it's yet to be seen how that strategy plays out in the U.S., Thursday's development in Paris doesn't necessarily signal the end of Strauss-Kahn's legal challenges in France. Despite today's decision by prosecutors, Banon is far from beaten in her battle to bring Strauss-Kahn to justice—in the courtroom or elsewhere. The 32 year-old author has previously said she'd seek a new inquiry into her accusations by filing a civil suit in the event her criminal case was dropped by prosecutors.

Meanwhile, Banon has been finding payback in other forms. Earlier Thursday, the writer's new book The Hypocrites' Ball was published in France. In it, she describes the unnamed Strauss-Kahn as “a pig” and “baboon” who “stole my life”. Given the media and public interest around Banon since she filed charges with authorities in July, she seems certain of obtaining best-seller status with her new book, quite intentionally at Strauss-Kahn's (continued) expense.

The Hypocrites Ball is the most recent in a series of Banon's almost entirely autobiographical “novels”; largely true stories from her own tormented life, built on such wrenching experiences and existential aching they make Morrissey sound like Ella Fitzgerald on ecstasy. But the new book is a more outwardly aimed work seeking to make third parties answer for internal damage they inflicted upon the author. It not only details the horrible acts and terrible consequences of the 2003 assault, but also denounces the politicians, media movers, and other VIPs who ignored her influential aggressor's reputation as a sexual predator, and actively dissuaded his victims from denouncing his acts. Given the ethical and legal gravity of Banon's depiction of mass complicity in allowing men like her 2003 attacker to act with impunity, it's not surprising “The Hypocrites' Ball” does not match characters with the real names of public figures she based them on. If Banon is bent on taking wrongdoers to court, she's obviously not keen on being dragged there herself for slander.

If the book sells as well as expected, Banon may have to use part of its profits to pursue new legal action against Strauss-Kahn. With prosecutors now having formally dropped her case against DSK, Banon's next probable move will be to file a civil complaint and request an independent magistrate to review testimony and evidence in the now closed inquiry. Should that judge uphold Thursday's decision, Banon could make a series of appeals seeking to get her case re-opened and taken to court. Either way things go, it would take months—if not years—for an appeals process to be exhausted, and just as long for a case against DSK to theoretically get to trial.

Could that happen? Hard to say, though Banon succeeding to get DSK before a court now seems to be even more of a long shot than before. Still, her struggle has not been in vain. In separate testimony and a face-to-face confrontation with investigators in September, Banon and Strauss-Kahn largely stuck to their conflicting versions of events. The only concession DSK made to flat denial of Banon's story was an avowal he made a pass at the young woman—but let it drop when she rebuffed him.

That, for many observers, was sufficient a detail to undermine DSK's long contention that Banon's accusation of sexual misconduct was “imaginary.” Meanwhile, prosecutors' findings that evidence of sexual assault charges was found—even if the statute of limitations on that has expired--represented what Banon's lawyer said was an intellectual and moral victory in the case, even if it was wrapped in a legally disappointing decision to drop it.

Would it change much if Banon were able to eventually bring Strauss-Kahn to court? Probably so, in terms of the future consequences for Banon and other French women who say male-dominated society has too often shrugged off the sexual abuse of women as a kind of naughty male mischief. Having their denunciations of sexual misconduct by French politicians, businessmen, and other influentials taken seriously depends, in the long run, on them being able to rely on the justice system backing them up, pursuing their charges, and bringing perpetrators to trial.

Yet such changes are usually part of a process. Meaning, even if she fails in her increasingly up-hill efforts to bring Strauss-Kahn to justice, Banon's campaign has already done quite a bit to awake public attention across both genders to the problem of sexual abuse. As a servant of French public interest—and a progressive to boot—it would be hard to imagine Strauss-Kahn being anything but pleased with that advance in social consciousness and gender quality, even if he most certainly isn't happy about the role he's had to play in raising it.

Greeks Take to the Streets Against More Cuts

Demonstrating high school students march towards the Greek Parliament on October 3, 2011 . High school students staged a protest march against the austerity measures, loss of jobs by their parents and the lack of books and teachers due to the crisis.

Louisa Gouliamaki / AFP / Getty Images

The Greek government is facing powerful public resistance to new austerity measures that foreign lenders are demanding in return for bailout loans. The country's main labor unions, ADEDY and GSEE, which represent 2.5 million workers, say they expect thousands to march to parliament on Wednesday to protest cuts in the public sector and a new property tax which will be collected through electricity bills.

The first general strike since June has grounded most international flights, halted trains and closed tax offices and some state schools. Hospitals are running on emergency staff. At the same time, inspectors from the European Union and International Monetary Fund continue their evaluation of Greece's finances to determine whether the country should receive $11 billion, the latest installment of a $150 billion bailout loan package, by next month. The Greek government said Tuesday it has enough cash to pay its bills only through November. (See photos of the protests in Greece.)

Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said Tuesday that Greeks must back the new measures if the country has any hope of meeting its deficit target for 2011, which was revised to 8.5% of gross domestic product from 7.6%. Along with tax hikes, budget cuts and the long-overdue reforming of the country's bloated public sector, the Greek government must also privatize some state assets and crack down on longtime tax evasion.

But winning public support for more austerity seems virtually impossible right now. Polls show that nearly all Greeks oppose more cuts and most believe the measures have done little to get Greece out of debt. More than a year of tax hikes and wage and pension cuts have decimated the middle class. Unemployment is at more than 16%. Personal bankruptcies, homelessness, suicides and crime are all on the rise. And yet the Greek government missed its deficit targets this year. Euro-zone finance ministers have decided to delay the latest loan payment, which Greece needs to stay solvent, because they don't think the country is trying hard enough to reform itself. More austerity, they say. (See photos of the global financial crisis.)

Yanis Varoufakis, a professor of economic theory at the University of Athens, is one of many economists who say austerity is actually killing an already weak Greek economy. "Anyone with any logic can see that this is not the way to jump-start the economy of a country that's in recession," Varoufakis says. Instead, austerity has put the economy in "a permafrost from which the Greek society has lost its capacity to react creatively to the crisis and to work itself out of the hole in which it has found itself."

Greeks have also lost faith in nearly all of their politicians. As the government party, center-left PASOK has suffered the most. "Right now, considering how big and unprecedented this financial crisis is, it's understood that the government committed the equivalent of political suicide a long time ago with the austerity drive," says Takis Pappas, a political science professor.

PASOK, which stands for the Panhellenic Socialist Movement, is led by George Papandreou, a quiet but stubborn sociologist and the American-born scion of Greece's most prominent political family. His grandfather and father were both premiers. His father, Andreas, who founded the party, was a Harvard-educated economist who built up the public sector to offer "jobs for life" to an emerging middle class in Greece. The civil service never became a bastion of Greece's best minds. Instead, it grew into an unwieldy monster overstuffed with party loyalists, many of whom were unqualified for their jobs.

Yet many Greeks, even well-educated ones, long desired a position in the civil service "because it was easy," Pappas says. "Now that option is gone. So for the government to restructure the civil service and make it truly productive, it has to make sure that it lays off not the bright, efficient workers but the ones who are not doing their jobs. It has to give people incentives to strive instead of rely on cronyism. The state needs to show that it has changed."

Anita Papachristopoulou, a 44-year-old environmental scientist who works for the Athens Water Supply and Sewer Company, says there's a grain of truth to the caricature of the lazy Greek civil servant worker. But she says there are thousands of Greek public-sector employees, like herself, who got their jobs through perseverance, not connections. "No one introduced me to anyone," says Papachristopoulou. "I just sent in my application cold, and I was lucky to get the job." (See why it's make up or break up time for the euro zone.)

Papachristopoulou says she was torn on going to Wednesday's demonstration, even though many of her colleagues will be there. She's worried about the usual street fights between anarcho-leftist activists and riot police outside parliament. Police always respond by firing tear gas at everyone, and the stinging clouds make her cough for days. "People are very angry," she says. "Even if we're not out on the streets chanting and marching, we're still angry."

See why the euro isn't fixed yet.

See if it's time to admit the euro has failed.

The Case Against Eating Baby Animals: It's About Flavor

Piglets on a farm in the German town of Nordhausen on Feb. 2, 2011

It's odd, given American meat eaters' sporadic bursts of conscience, that as a nation we are so O.K. with infanticide. Veal cutlets, suckling pigs, spring lambs, game hens — with or without the euphemisms, I know that I've made my peace with eating very young animals. But it's hard not to be struck by the peculiar blindness of people who fawn over puppies and kittens and devour their barnyard analogs.

I don't have much to say on the subject of morality, and wouldn't presume to offer advice to fellow sinners even if I did, but I can say this: if you want a good reason not to eat baby animals, consider the fact that they really don't taste that good. (See the top 10 miniature animals.)

Animals, like most everything else in nature, grow stronger as they move from infancy to adulthood: they develop more fat, more muscle, more everything. They've eaten more food, and the food they've eaten changes them; it makes them taste like their food, which can be a very good thing indeed. I am against eating baby animals on gastronomic principle alone. The flavor of all immature animals is uniformly bland. The real taste of sheep isn't to be found in lamb, but rather in mutton; no teensy little 4-lb. chicken is ever going to have the flavor of a fat old hen.

So why, then, do we persist in eating babies? One reason, though not the real one, has to do with texture. Baby animals don't taste great — really, they don't taste much like anything — but their flesh is tender and so satisfies a country where the greatest compliment any meat can receive is that "you can eat it with a spoon." Yes, baby animals are "like butter," but so what? Take an old tom turkey, or the shoulder of a 250-lb. hog, and cook it for many hours in a heavy pot, a slow oven or a sous vide bag, and it'll be "like butter" too.

No, the real reason we eat a lot of baby animals is much cruder than any misguided preference for tender meat. Here's the thing about raising meat: Americans don't like to pay a lot for it. The longer an animal lives, the longer its owner has to shelter it and feed it; so every day it's allowed to live makes it less profitable. That's why the ribs at Burger King are the size of dominoes, and the chicken at Popeyes is barely bigger than quail. It's not pure evil on the part of the producers; even small farms can't afford to keep many animals alive for many years. (See photos of animals that can think.)

Which is sad, both for the animals and for us. I was in Italy last week, and, as you might expect, I ate a lot of good things (spaghetti, obviously; there was spaghetti flying at all four walls). But the thing that made the strongest impression on me was probably the single ugliest thing I ate during the whole week: a plate of braised wild boar in Montalcino. That boar tasted powerfully of pork. Not sage, not smoke, not soy or mustard or red-pepper vinegar. No, it tasted like pork. If you had a pork chop like that in Chicago or Atlanta, your first thought would be that it had gone bad. It was "gamey," a catch-all adjective that we use to describe meat tastes that aren't mellow and sweet.

But that's O.K.; grownup people should like grownup tastes. In any case, the art of cooking is supplied with a lot of strong flavors to complement and support big, bold tastes. "I like tastes that know their own minds," wrote A.J. Liebling, one of the all-time great gastronomes, in 1959. "The reason that people who detest fish often tolerate sole is that sole doesn't taste very much like fish, and even this degree of resemblance disappears when it is submerged in [sauce]." Liebling thought such indifference to intrinsic flavor was a sign of weak-mindedness, and he thought that it also explained the popularity of such things as Golden Delicious apples, American cheese and vodka cocktails.

If you want to taste what meat really is, then don't eat lamb: eat mutton. You already know how much better a great steak is than a thin, wan piece of veal, so wouldn't it follow that that steak would taste even better another year down the road? Food writer Jeffrey Steingarten is still talking about a 10-year-old draft ox he ate a couple of years ago in Spain. Maybe I'll go there on my next trip.

Ozersky is a James Beard Award—winning food writer and the author of The Hamburger: A History. He is currently at work on a biography of Colonel Sanders. Taste of America, Ozersky's food column for TIME.com, appears every Wednesday.

Read about what goes on in the mind of an animal.

See photos of 10 animals facing extinction.

The Case Against Eating Baby Animals: It's About Flavor

It's odd, given American meat eaters' sporadic bursts of conscience, that as a nation we are so okay with infanticide. Veal cutlets, suckling pigs, spring lambs, game hens — with or without the euphemisms, I know that I've made my peace with eating very young animals. But it's hard not to be struck by the peculiar blindness of people who fawn over puppies and kittens and devour their barnyard analogs.

I don't have much to say on the subject of morality, and wouldn't presume to offer advice to fellow sinners even if I did, but I can say this: if you want a good reason not to eat baby animals, consider the fact that they really don't taste that good. (See the top 10 miniature animals.)

Animals, like most everything else in nature, grow stronger as they move from infancy to adulthood; they develop more fat, more muscle, more everything. They've eaten more food, and the food they've eaten changes them; it makes them taste like their food, which can be a very good thing indeed. I am against eating baby animals on gastronomic principle alone. The flavor of all immature animals is uniformly bland. The real taste of sheep isn't to be found in lamb, but rather in mutton; no teensy little 4-lb. chicken is ever going to have the flavor of a fat old hen.

So why, then, do we persist in eating babies? One reason, though not the real one, has to do with texture. Baby animals don't taste great — really, they don't taste much like anything — but their flesh is tender and so satisfies a country where the greatest compliment any meat can receive is that "you can eat it with a spoon." Yes, baby animals are "like butter," but so what? Take an old tom turkey, or the shoulder of a 250-lb. hog, and cook it for many hours in a heavy pot, a slow oven or a sous vide bag, and it'll be "like butter" too.

No, the real reason we eat a lot of baby animals is much cruder than any misguided preference for tender meat. Here's the thing about raising meat: Americans don't like to pay a lot for it. The longer an animal lives, the longer its owner has to shelter it and feed it; so every day it's allowed to live makes it less profitable. That's why the ribs at Burger King are the size of dominoes, and the chicken at Popeyes is barely bigger than quail. It's not pure evil on the part of the producers; even small farms can't afford to keep many animals alive for many years. (See photos of animals that can think.)

Which is sad, both for the animals, and for us. I was in Italy last week, and, as you might expect, I ate a lot of good things (spaghetti, obviously; there was spaghetti flying at all four walls). But the thing that made the strongest impression on me was probably the single ugliest thing I ate during the whole week: a plate of braised wild boar in Montalcino. That boar tasted powerfully of pork. Not sage, not smoke, not soy or mustard or red-pepper vinegar. No, it tasted like pork. If you had a pork chop like that in Chicago or Atlanta, your first thought would be that it had gone bad. It was "gamey," a catch-all adjective that we use to describe meat tastes that aren't mellow and sweet.

But that's okay; grown-up people should like grownup tastes. In any case, the art of cooking is supplied with a lot of strong flavors to complement and support big, bold tastes. "I like tastes that know their own minds," wrote A.J. Liebling, one of the all-time great gastronomes, in 1959. "The reason that people who detest fish often tolerate sole is that sole doesn't taste very much like fish, and even this degree of resemblance disappears when it is submerged in [sauce]." Liebling thought such indifference to intrinsic flavor was a sign of weak-mindedness, and he thought that it also explained the popularity of such things as Golden Delicious apples, American cheese and vodka cocktails.

If you want to taste what meat really is, then don't eat lamb: eat mutton. You already know how much better a great steak is than a thin, wan piece of veal, so wouldn't it follow that that steak would taste even better another year down the road? Food writer Jeffrey Steingarten is still talking about a 10-year-old draft ox he ate a couple of years ago in Spain. Maybe I'll go there on my next trip.

Ozersky is a James Beard Award—winning food writer and the author of The Hamburger: A History. He is currently at work on a biography of Colonel Sanders. Taste of America, Ozersky's food column for TIME.com, appears every Wednesday.

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