I have been proud to proclaim for the past three years that I was among a plurality of Americans who did not vote for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election.

I proclaim yet again. There. I said it.

However, the 2020 election is going to present Americans with another challenge. It deals with that saying you’ve likely heard: Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

A minority of Americans got fooled in 2016 by the huckster posing as a presidential candidate. A quirk in the U.S. election system enabled Donald Trump to win the presidency on the strength of the Electoral College system; he won enough electoral votes to win.

So, what might this mean for the 2020 election? It well might mean that Trump is in a position to stage the same kind of victory he scored four years earlier.

Which compels me to invoke what I believe was arguably the nation’s most profound political mistake with Donald Trump’s fluke election in 2016.

A man with no public service experience, or the lack of any shred of public involvement in his entire adult life managed to win the only public office he ever sought. He tapped into some dark national mood to win enough votes in just the right states.

What’s more, he has governed the same way he campaigned. He has appealed to Americans’ anger at, let’s see, the media, something called “The Deep State,” socialists, political correctness, immigrants (legal and illegal).

Granted, the economy has continued to do well under Donald Trump’s time as president. However, he inherited an economy in good shape, so I’ll give him credit for not shredding it.

It’s all the other stuff that has me hoping that he gets the boot in 2020 that he avoided getting in 2016. He treats allies like enemies; he disparages our institutions; he trashes presidential tradition.

And of course he abuses the power of his office. The House of Representatives is likely to impeach the president. He’ll stand trial and is likely to avoid conviction on a constitutional “technicality.” Then he will get to campaign for re-election.

Is this nation really and truly ready to return this man — who is replete with his myriad idiotic pronouncements — to the Oval Office?

My goodness. Let us not get fooled again.