From the Publisher

By Robert L. Miller

$ We at TIME are usually credited with having invented group journalism, the application of many minds to one story. We'll accept that credit, but we're equally proud of another tradition: when an individual writer or correspondent has something special to impart, we make space on our pages for that writer's words alone. This is true of weekly stories, and also of regular columns. Since 1973 Hugh Sidey has written a column for TIME on the presidency as seen from his own special perspective. For twelve years Tom Griffith has dispensed his seasoned views on the press in his Newswatch column.

This week another columnist of formidable stature debuts in the World section under the title America Abroad. The author is Washington bureau chief Strobe Talbott, who has unraveled the complexities of foreign policy in a wide variety of TIME stories since 1971. Twice a month America Abroad will offer readers a regular opportunity to read one of Washington's most perceptive observers of foreign affairs. Says World editor James Kelly: "Talbott has the rare ability to explore complicated issues in a manner that is lucid and provocative."

Talbott plans to use the column as a vehicle for both reporting and taking his own stands. "While I think of myself as essentially a reporter, I have strong views on most matters too," he says. Talbott's choice of subject will often reflect his credentials as an expert in U.S.-Soviet affairs and as the author of three books chronicling the past twelve years of superpower arms- control diplomacy, but he plans to vary the scope of America Abroad. He will weigh in at times with topical examinations of news events, step back on other occasions to take a historical perspective and devote a column now and then to one compelling personality.

Hot off the presses: TIME's second book, The Winning of the White House 1988. Written by five TIME staffers who covered the campaign, edited by special projects editor Donald Morrison and introduced by historian Garry Wills, this concise inside story is the first book-length chronicle to reach the bookstores after the longest and nastiest presidential campaign in memory. Read it for the definitive account of how George Bush won.