I think you're absolutely right about conservatives co-opting things like cancel culture for political gain. But I don't think you took these things seriously enough.

With cancel culture, several prominent intellectuals on the left have expressed a lot of concern over our current censorious intellectual climate. That's why liberals like Noam Chomsky, John McWhorter, Malcom Gladwell etc. signed the Harper's letter, with gave voice to that exact concern.

As with the police, currently 33% of young people are in favor of literally abolishing the police (gallup). The New York Times ran an op-ed last year with the title "Yes, We Mean Literally Abolish the Police." And of course, activists blocked an entire section of Seattle off and kicked the police out to try and prove their point.

The radical left is not just a fiction created by conservatives. It is a real thing with way too much influence and if more moderate people on the left aren't willing to call it out, it's game over for the American experiment as far as I can see.