I voted for Trump in the general. I couldn't stand the idea of Clinton walking into the White House. She disgusted me and, as Michael Moore stated numerous times, voting for Trump seemed like a huge "Fuck you!" to the current political system that I had looked upon with disdain and apathy. So Trump wins, all is great, right? Except his cabinet picks have been lackluster, he has already backtracked on numerous issues, and has not shown a capability to see past his own nose when it comes to picking fights with "fake news".
He has not shown me anything that has impressed me since his "drain the swamp" message was disavowed by the man less than a week after the election. I just hope that he ends up rejuvenating my dying hope that he could really be the anti-establishment candidate he tried so hard to prove he was in the primaries.
Well, I went ultra-anti-establishment, and voted for the full Johnson. :p
I complete agree with your title sentiment, however, which is precisely why I voted Johnson. "The only wasted vote is a vote you don't believe in." Both of them are terrible people, ill-equipped to be president, and not at all what I wanted to see. Johnson is not amazingly better, and he's hardly perfect, but he was obviously the best choice. In his own way, he was almost the establishment Libertarian candidate, if such a thing can even exist in this land.
Since you've mentioned before you're in a swing state, I imagine the choice was harder for you. If Clinton won here, she had the election in the bag, no question. So my vote was irrelevant either way. But I still believe that you should put aside the numbers, and projections, and swing state status, and vote your conscience, every time. If your conscience said Trump was the best candidate, then that's fine. If it didn't, I would argue you should have voted for the best person available; and if that means they are doomed to lose, and your vote doomed to be meaningless, so be it.
As for this election cycle, I can proudly say I have voted for my conscience; I voted for what was right, and true, and what I believe was in the best interests of Americans, but also others around the world.
I'm still slightly more optimistic for Trump than you are, I suppose, but only because the cynical side of me sees no upside to this man being president.