By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

I guess I have figured out how Donald Trump gets away with his lying, his misleading statements and his continual assaults on foes via innuendo and invective.

Trump has managed to lower the bar to ground level. That is to say that Americans do not expect this guy to behave like a mature, sophisticated and nuanced adult as he conducts the affairs of state.

Trump has changed the equation. I just hope it isn’t a forever change.

That all circles back to why I want him defeated Nov. 3. It is why I want Joe Biden to take office in January as our 46th president of the United States.

A famed Republican lawyer, an expert on elections, has written an op-ed in which he declares that Trump’s so-called fear of election fraud caused by mail-in balloting is “misleading.”  So said Ben Ginsburg. Will it move anyone away from Trump’s avid base of supporters? Hardly. Again, they have no expectation of intellectual or moral honesty from the president.

Do not consider me to be naive, but I always have wanted — and expected — presidents to be better than the rest of us. I long have looked up to the men who have sat in that chair behind the Resolute Desk. I was born during the Truman years, but since the days of President Eisenhower — the man I first remembered as our nation’s leader — I have thought well enough of each man that they have earned my respect.

Until now.

Donald Trump has squandered that respect. He frittered it away from the years he spent as a reality TV celebrity and as a flimflam real estate mogul.

Then he became president. Jeez, I am having trouble even acknowledging these days that he was “elected” to the office. I digress. Back to my point.

Donald Trump has set the expectations for his behavior to a level I do not recognize. It’s not that I want him to reach higher. I know better than to expect the impossible to occur.

Joe Biden isn’t the perfect alternative to Donald Trump. Based on his own sense of decency and his ability and willingness to tell us the truth even when it hurts, he has earned my support.

Just maybe Joe Biden can hoist that expectations bar to a more rational, respectable and customary level.