I'm not completely unsympathetic to your argument. I bought Moore's Trumpland this week-end.
I bought it because I was a gigantic Hillary fan in 1992/3 and through her husband's first term. My dad and I agreed that the country would be better off if she were president instead of her husband. She was savaged by nearly everyone: Big insurance, Reagan Era Republicans, the Meedja and not least of all her own husband and the great unwashed at large. I bought and watched Trumpland because I thought if anyone could give me a good reason to vote for HRC, it would be as likely to be Michael Moore as anyone. He almost had me. During his act, he makes people recall the savagery Hillary had to endure during the 1990's, how she at least tried to get us universal healthcare, but the health insurance industry was able to convince the majority of Murican Morons that was a bad thing. It famously failed and has never been attempted since, Moore rightly points out. He said the people abandoned her back then, and he's largely correct. He focused on her early days (that time when I was a fan) and basically said to look at the changes she'd made to promote her husband. He said he was hoping that the past 12 years or so she'd been laying back in the weeds, waiting for her opportunity when she had real power. That after she was elected it would be up to all of us to keep her honest and on the Progressive track.
He almost had me. But upon further reflection, I realized what he was saying is akin to what you've been saying, "Vote for her in the hope that she isn't really what she appears to be." I've done that sort of voting for most of my adult life and I'm finished doing that. I will henceforth cease to ever again vote for the evil of two lessers. If no one on the ballot represents the policies I support, then I will abstain from voting. You may differ, but refusing to support someone who does not share your values and does not support the policies you support is the only sane approach to the solemn duty of voting.
He almost had me. But upon further reflection, I realized what he was saying is akin to what you've been saying, "Vote for her in the hope that she isn't really what she appears to be." I've done that sort of voting for most of my adult life and I'm finished doing that. I will henceforth cease to ever again vote for the evil of two lessers. If no one on the ballot represents the policies I support, then I will abstain from voting. You may differ, but refusing to support someone who does not share your values and does not support the policies you support is the only sane approach to the solemn duty of voting.