Horsewoman #2: Sheila Bair, chairman of the FDIC

What she said: Back in 2007, seeing that the escalating number of home foreclosures threatened the entire banking system, Bair called for Ben Bernanke’s Fed to require banks to tighten lending standards and to convert their adjustable-rate sub-prime mortgages into traditional fixed-rate mortgages. This fall, Bair criticized Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s $700 billion bailout plan in a Wall Street Journal interview, suggesting that more of the money be earmarked for struggling homeowners rather than banks. "Why there’s been such a political focus on making sure we’re not unduly helping borrowers but then we’re providing all this massive assistance at the institutional level, I don’t understand it. It’s been a frustration for me."

Who is trying to screw her: Her tendency to speak truth to power has provoked the New York Fed Chair Timothy Geithner, Obama’s nominee for Treasury Secretary, who according to a story on Bloomberg.com last week, is maneuvering to force her to resign before her 2011 term is over.

The result: The Fed ignored her 2007 call to tighten lending standards until 2008, and has just in the last weeks finally proposed banks convert toxic mortgages to more traditional fixed-rate ones. So far, the popular Bair is hanging tough, with both Democrats in Congress and journalists singing her praises as an independently minded regulator, and she still speaks out about moving more of the Paulson Plan’s $700 billion away from Wall Street and toward Main Street.

Quote to set your teeth on edge: “I think part of the problem now, to be honest, is Sheila Bair has annoyed the ‘old boys’ club. To some extent, bank regulation and mortgage foreclosure have made a situation where we have several regulators up in the tree house with a ‘no girls allowed’ sign — and it’s aimed at Sheila Bair — who’s been really good.” —Congressman Barney Frank to Bloomberg.com

Horsewoman #3: Meredith Whitney, Managing Director and Analyst, Oppenheimer & Co.

What she said: On Halloween 2007, she became the first analyst to call out Citibank on their toxic mortgage derivatives, claiming that the bank was under-capitalized and would be forced to cut its dividend. She downgraded its stock to "market underperform," setting off a firestorm.

Who tried to screw her: She received death threats in the days after her Citibank call, and thousands of hate e-mails.

The result: While Citi declined to specifically comment on Whitney’s analysis, four days later, Citibank’s CEO Chuck Prince resigned. The bank maintained that it could rebuild its capital ratio by the middle of 2008 without a dividend cut. In late November 2008, Citibank was the latest bank to seek a government bailout, the terms of which slashed its dividend to a penny a share. The stock price slid from $41.90 on 10/31/07 to $7.40 on 12/5/08. As a result, Whitney has been hailed as the most prescient and influential financial analyst to emerge in the meltdown.

Quote to set your teeth on edge: Thomas Brown, blogger, BankStocks.com, called Whitney "incredibly arrogant" and in his August 2008 post states: "Every cycle there’s one analyst who races to be the most bearish, and this time it’s her. Honestly, I think we’ll look back and see that Meredith Whitney’s credibility peaked on July 15 (2008)," a date he believed "financials had made their bottom." Two months later, Lehman Brothers collapsed, and the current financial emergency was on.