TAMMY BRUCE: Why the liberal establishment is collapsing.

Democrats and liberals have been driving drunk while texting for eight years. Swerving into the wrong lane, they crashed into oncoming traffic and sit, dazed and confused, wondering what happened. The few survivors crawl out of the clown car screaming at the innocent people they’ve harmed. After all, it’s never their fault, you see, it’s everyone else’s for daring to get in their way.

Oscar host Jimmy Kimmel led the way, as Entertainment Weekly noted, “The first salvo against Donald Trump was fired only a few minutes into the Oscars — and then they just kept on coming. In what might be an unprecedented number of jokes, allusions, and sincere articulations inspired by a single person during an awards telecast, Hollywood’s most luminous tackled Trump and his policies. …”

The target may have been President Trump, but the derision was meant for the people who elected him. Nothing says “oops” like ridiculing your audience.

I apparently was one of the millions who didn’t tune in, causing the ABC network program to be the least-watched in nine years. The Los Angeles Times spent thousands of words trying to explain why the awards show had its third year of ratings decline. It was late, they explained, small budget films and, they mused pensively, maybe, just maybe, “[t]he promise of strong criticism of President Trump from the Oscars participants may also have put off some viewers.”

Ya think? But it’s not about criticism of any particularly president, it’s Hollywood’s constant sanctimonious lecturing of the unwashed hoi polloi.

People generally don’t sit down in front of the TV or make a trip down to the multiplex in order to enjoy a sanctimonious lecture — a simple reality reflected in declining ratings and fewer ticket sales.