Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday readied a proposal to cut state worker salaries by an additional 5% as local government officials lambasted his bid to take $2 billion from cities and counties to help curb the state's growing budget deficit.

The governor's proposed salary reduction would affect 235,000 state workers who already are taking mandatory unpaid furloughs to help the state grapple with a projected budget gap of $24.3 billion.

Combined with the furloughs, ordered by Schwarzenegger earlier this year, the new proposed salary cuts would push many state employees' wages down by about 15%, saving the state $470 million…

"The fuse is lit, and now he's assessing the potential carnage?"
(Rhetorical question in letter from 17 Senators to the Governor)

No sooner had we sent out our budget memo Monday than our dreams came true. Nightmare is a better description—the type that wanders off into tangential eccentricities. Lawsuits and letters began flying, fueling the already dreadful deadline dementia saturating the Capitol.

First, kill all the lawyers. As promised, Governor Debtinator (Nickname attributed to Steve Offerman of Ventura County) consummated his threat to sue Controller Chiang over reducing payments to State Workers. He plunged ahead, despite Monday's three-page memo from Chiang's office asking a whole raft of questions about who is actually covered, who is among the 50,000 exemptions, who isn't, proper handling of worker benefits, and a number of other prickly annoyances…

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration on Tuesday asked state Controller John Chiang to temporarily cut the pay of roughly 180,000 state employees while exempting about 50,000 workers in a patchwork of departments.

Schwarzenegger's formal pay letter moves him closer to a legal battle with Chiang, whose office said Tuesday he will defy the instructions and continue to pay full salaries to state workers.

The governor signed an executive order last week that terminated 10,133 part-time and temporary employees while banning overtime for most workers and attempting to slash salaries until a state budget is approved…