Hollings writes about life as a public servant

Former Sen. Ernest F. "Fritz" Hollings believes that in politics, money is the cancer of the age.

And he approaches the scourge like a surgeon in "Making Government Work: Lessons from a Life in Politics," to be released Monday by the University of South Carolina Press.

Written with Kirk Victor, who covers the U.S. Senate for the National Journal, the book is equal parts memoir of a career in public service and a cautionary on the political and economic quandaries that face the nation.

Hollings says he had no intention of trotting out a tedious he said, she said narrative.

"I knew that if I was to write an autobiography, I was going to focus on what was really significant that I know about, something that would be a theme," Hollings said. "And that theme is trying to make the government work again. We have a standoff now, and the election in November is not going to change this, not until they cut the money and untie the knot. The campaigns are way too long. Ten years ago, I had to raise $8.5 million, which is $30,000 a week, every week, for six years. Money is the cancer on the body politic. Nothing will get done until you cut the money."

Read more in Sunday's Arts & Travel section of The Post and Courier.