TheBakersfieldCalifornian.com

An enthusiastic crowd gathered at the downtown Liberty Bell Thursday evening -- Tax Day -- for a Bakersfield Tea Party Patriots rally.

Bill Lind, 42, co-organizer of the local group, estimated about 1,000 people in all came and went during the event.

Numerous homemade signs held aloft by attendees boasted a raft of messages, including:

* Taxed/Enough/Already;

* Cut taxes/cut spending/cut the government -- now;

* Deport all illegal aliens;

* We can't fire stupid/but we can vote them out;

* It's not about left or right/it's about liberty;

* Community organizers suck!/taxpayers dry;

* You are not entitled to what I have earned;

* Obamus Tyrranus;

and dozens of others.

A truck bearing window signs that read "Impeach Sheik Obama" drew applause from those who saw it go by.

Lind said he was pleased the rally wasn't marred by negative incidents or infiltrators as some organizers had worried.

Attendees listened to speakers and singers and enjoyed camaraderie with like-minded folks.

"I feel guilty about the country we're leaving my kids and grandchildren," said Dan Miller, 58. He and his wife also went to last year's rally and have been to smaller tea party gatherings here and in Fresno.

"There are people here trying to educate other people about our Constitution and the intention of the framers who wrote it," said Ken O'Rand, 70, who helped a friend sell self-printed T-shirts.

Pastor Bill Rohrer of the Weldon United Methodist Church and Highland Chapel United Methodist Church in Lake Isabella gave a prayer and a speech warning people their children could become communists.

"We need to hold fast to what we believe," Rohrer told the crowd, before launching into stories of two children who later grew up to be communist leaders Karl Marx and Mao Zedong.

"Your child or grandchild may be the next Karl Marx," Rohrer warned.

Bakersfield radio host Jaz McKay of KNZR fired up the crowd by warning about the "ever-fading love of freedom and liberty" in the United States.

"A great pestilence was unleashed on the fabric of our country" in 2008, McKay intoned, enunciating the president's full name, Barack Hussein Obama, to a chorus of boos and saying Obama had done "irreparable damage."

McKay told the crowd the upcoming 2010 elections may be "the last year possible to preserve our liberty and reputation through the ballot box," and drew cheers when suggesting voters "remove these dangerous Marxist Democrats" from office.

"Are you up for the fight?" McKay asked. "Yes, I said fight," he added.

One man, 70-year-old Ed Rudd, sat on a bench at the edge of the crowd with two small dogs, Buster and Lilly, who made him many new friends.

Rudd, who was born in England, grew up in Canada and became an American citizen just two years ago, said he felt sorry for the "young kids growing up in this kind of mess."

"It's so screwed up it's unbelievable," Rudd said. "I thought it was bad when we had Carter. Then we got Clinton. What we got now -- who ever thought we would be treading down the steps of socialism."