Investing oracle Warren Buffett has an avuncular image, but a sharp tongue. (In January, he bashed the "guilt" tax and said that despite his $37 billion wealth, he feels "poor.") He comes out strongly in his annual investors' letter criticizing Wall Street hotshots:

To say these owners have been 'bailed-out' is to make a mockery of the term... Their fortunes may have been diminished by the disasters they oversaw, but they still live in grand style. It is the behavior of these CEOs and directors that needs to be changed: If their institutions and the country are harmed by their recklessness, they should pay a heavy price - one not reimbursable by the companies they've damaged nor by insurance

Buffett reserved some fire for the health care system, which he compared to a "tapeworm" in a weekend CNBC interview. He exhorted Congress to push ahead on reforms:

It's like a tapeworm eating at our economic body...If it was a choice today between Plan A, which is what we've got, or Plan B, which is the Senate bill, I would vote for the Senate bill. But I would much rather see a Plan C that really attacks costs, and I think that's what the American public wants to see.

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