Here's a shocker: with credit markets about as tight as they've ever been and huge writedowns and a depressed stock market leaving few banks with much cash to invest, General Motors (NYSE: GM) is having trouble finding anyone to bankroll a prospective "2 drunken sailors" merger with Chrysler.

The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription required) that "several of the potential lenders remain unconvinced. Credit markets remain extremely tight, and a number of lenders are fearful of the complexity and scale of combining two industrial giants amid an economic downturn. . . But GM, Cerberus and its banks aren't ruling out selling a stake in the new company to the federal government."

That seems to be the philosophy du jour in corporate America: if you can't find a private investor dumb enough to pour money into your pipe dream, there's always the federal government. The sad thing is that, given the pivotal role that the Rust Belt can play in swinging elections, the special interest groups may be able to sway lawmakers into scraping the bottom of the broken piggy bank to fund this abortion.

The Journal reports that the companies' pitch to investors touts cost savings of as much as $10 billion because of expense slashing and synergy. But private investors or lawmakers looking it over would do well to remember the golden rule of M&A: estimates of cost savings are nearly always too optimistic, and integration costs are usually underestimated.

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