diff --git a/cmd2.py b/cmd2.py
index <HASH>..<HASH> 100755
--- a/cmd2.py
+++ b/cmd2.py
@@ -319,7 +319,8 @@ def get_paste_buffer():
     """
     pb_str = pyperclip.paste()
 
-    if six.PY2:
+    # If value returned from the clipboard is unicode and this is Python 2, convert to a "normal" Python 2 string first
+    if six.PY2 and not isinstance(pb_str, str):
         import unicodedata
         pb_str = unicodedata.normalize('NFKD', pb_str).encode('ascii', 'ignore')
Minor attempt at ruggedization of clipboard stuff in some weird cases on Python 2