The grand bargain here would be that Chrysler, driven into the ground by nine years of German ownership and a tenth by Cerberus-backed dabbling in the car business, would surrender its choicest assets -- Jeep, minivans, large cars and Dodge pickups -- to GM and the rest would be discarded. That would be plants and people, engineers and designers, salaried employees and union workers, a devastating blow to southeastern Michigan and other Chrysler communities.

'Chrysler's already dead,' an industry wag told me Thursday, echoing a familiar theme of the past few weeks. 'The government is really worried about GM imploding. The picture these guys have painted is that this is GM's desperate hour.'

Yes, they have -- and they haven't even reported their third-quarter financial results, likely to show a sharp revenue decline and an astonishing rate of cash burn. If anything, the numbers are likely to bolster the case for some kind of industrial combination-cum-government intervention, a political likelihood however debatable both may be financially and operationally.

'The global economic outlook remains very concerning,' GM Chairman Rick Wagoner and President Fritz Henderson told GM employees in a memo. 'As a result, actions are being taken throughout GM's global operations to address our increasing need to conserve cash.'

Which should be seen for the red-flag admission that it is. Cash is the lifeblood of business, especially one like GM (and Chrysler and Ford Motor Co.) with limited, if any, access to credit markets. GM is nixing 401(k) contributions, suspending stock savings plan matches, eliminating tuition reimbursement and planning involuntary layoffs of salaried employees.

It is shopping its ACDelco parts operation, moving ahead with the sale of its Hummer brand, banning unscheduled overtime, cutting assembly plant shifts, accelerating plant closures, tweaking salaried benefits and even trying to find a buyer for its RenCen headquarters in downtown Detroit -- all of them measures to raise cash.

Acquiring some or all of Chrysler is, at base, a bid for its potentially profitable pieces and the incremental revenue that would come with the volume. But the likelihood is that it would take years, far longer than GM has right now, to realize the 'synergies' the combined enterprise allegedly would glean.

Near-term, this GM-Chrysler roll-up reeks of a play for government cash, with jobs, pensions, retiree health care and local tax bases used as the leverage to get it. Not a promising bargain, nor much of an assurance the downward spiral would end.