Time Magazine Contents Page

COVER: The Tower report rocks 20

the White House to its foundations

The President, exposed as uninvolved and unaware, must try to redraw the panel' s devastating portrait of a leaderless Administration. -- Washington hails the choice of Howard Baker as chief of staff. -- Computer memos detail Oliver North' s reckless overreaching. -- Reagan Agonistes: Author Garry Wills muses on the evanescence of the Reagan bedazzlement. See NATION.

WORLD: Syrian forces enter West Beirut 48

to contain the P. L. O. and radical Shi' ites

Alarmed by continuing anarchy and military threats to his ally, the Amal militia, President Hafez Assad attempts to impose order on the chaotic Lebanese capital. -- A power struggle breaks out in China that threatens Leader Deng Xiaoping. -- Mikhail Gorbachev' s glasnost worries Eastern Europe' s aging rulers. -- A life sentence for terrorism in Paris.

BUSINESS: Alarms are sounding that 58

America' s debt load is growing dangerous

Individuals, corporations and even Uncle Sam himself are, to put it bluntly, in hock as never before in history. Time' s Board of Economists warns that the debts, while still manageable, threaten the economy and the future welfare of every American. -- Pan Am, desperately seeking survival, considers putting its shuttle up for sale. -- London' s messy stock- trading scandal.

66

Law

Rebuffing the Reagan Administration, a divided Supreme Court for the first time upholds the use of racial quotas in promotions.

67

Medicine

A study of Amish families with a history of manic depression provides the first genetic evidence that mental illness can be inherited.

70

Science

One of nature' s most spectacular and significant events, a nearby supernova brightens southern skies and elates astronomers.

72

Sport

How Golfer Craig Stadler came to own a pair of trousers worth $37,000. -- S. M. U. football draws a "death" penalty.

75

Books

John Gregory Dunne' s The Red White and Blue chronicles the corruptibility of power. -- Toscanini is reappraised and devalued.

84

Health & Fitness

Massage, once featured in sleazy parlors, is now the respectable stress reliever offered in malls, airports and even offices.

86

Cinema

Alan Parker' s Angel Heart loses an X rating and saves its gritty soul. -- Some Kind of Wonderful: more teen angst from John Hughes.

90

Art

Andy Warhol, the silver- wigged, ageless child of media fame who cranked out images of a consumer culture, dies at 58.

11 Letters

16 American Scene

69 People

78 Photography

85 Living

88 Theater

89 Milestones

Cover: Photograph by Dirck Halstead