Last month, it was announced that CosmoGirl was folding. And what better way to close out its ending December/January double issue than with Taylor Swift as its cover girl!

The 18-year-old country cutie, who picked up Favorite Female Country Artist at the AMAs last night, is featured on the cover and in an accompanying five-page spread, where she is lauded with the lead position in the magazine’s annual Born To Lead honors section. Taylor was photographed for the feature in New York’s Central Park.

Check out the full photo spread at JJJ.

Taylor Swift: Insider Special Edition, a special episode of CMT Insider, premieres this Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, at 10AM ET. She will join Jay Leno on The Tonight Show on December 5th for a performance and interview.

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Taylor Swift runs through her secret performance onstage during the 2008 American Music Awards rehearsals held at the Nokia Theatre L.A. Live on Friday in Los Angeles.

The 18-year-old country cutie recently told CMT that she reads JustJared.com to “see what’s going on with celebrities. I like to have things to talk about. It’s not like you can just make movies and sing songs and people aren’t going to want to know who you’re dating and where you’re eating. I’m curious about that too. I’ll admit that.”

She also mentions that she doesn’t pay attention to the haters: “I just try to ignore the ‘I hate her, she’s ugly’ ones. When people can be anonymous, they’re vicious and it’s like sixth grade stuff like on crack. It’s terrible.”

Below is a video Taylor just made, showing some of the highlights from the release week of her #1 album in the country, Fearless. Celebrities that hold up the #1 sign in support of Taylor: Kid Rock, Kellie Pickler, Miley Cyrus, Hilary Duff, Snoop Doff, Nelly, Good Charlotte, Fall Out Boy, Ludacris, Diddy, Kenny Chesney, Vanessa Minnillo and Reba McEntire.

#1 with a bullet.

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Taylor Swift just broke a new record with “White Horse,” a track from her new album Fearless that was featured on the season premiere of Grey’s Anatomy.

The soulful song will debut at #13 on Billboard’s all-genre Hot 100 singles chart this week, giving the 18-year-old country cutie her 6th Top 20 debut of 2008. This breaks the all-time Billlboard record for the number of Top 20 debuts in a calendar year by any artist.

The previous record with five Top 20 Debuts this year was held by her ex-boyfriend Joe Jonas’s pop-rock group, The Jonas Brothers.

Taylor’s other five songs that made the Top 20 include “Change”, “Fearless”, “You’re Not Sorry”, “You Belong With Me” and “Love Story”.

Fearless also sold 592,304 units in its first week of sales (her last album sold 3.5 million). Comparatively, the JoBros sold over 525,000 units of their latest album, A Little Bit Longer (their last album sold 1.5 million).

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Country superstar Taylor Swift has the #1 album in America, ya’ll!!!

The 18-year-old singer/songwriter’s sophomore effort, Fearless, sold 592,000 copies in the last week, the largest opening U.S. sales week in 2008 by a female artist and the fourth biggest overall, behind Lil Wayne, AC/DC and Coldplay.

Universal Music Group, the world’s biggest music company, also just has signed an international marketing and distribution deal with Taylor’s label Big Machine Records.

“She is by some distance the biggest breakthrough for an American artist in America over the last year,” executive vice president of Universal Music Group International Max Hole tells Reuters. “I don’t really see her as a country artist. If you listen to the records and see her play live, she has much more in common with acts like Avril Lavigne and Miley Cyrus.”

Congrats, Taylor!!! You’re #1!!!

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