Cost of industrial non-organic grain production, herbicides, insecticides and the whole lot vs hey cow, here's some natural prairie, now go eat it, which doesn't cost as much environmentally.
Europeans decimated the Americas for their corn fed fatty marbled cattle. The rainforests are being cleared for soy, as with most arable crops a high percentage are grown as animal feeds. So there isn't any escape. Eating a cow has collateral damage too.
Take a fraction of those arable crops, don't bother meat farming and move over to better farming methods that are more in tune with nature. It's a balancing act.
If you haven't any ethical qualms about meat eating then you can still farm those fringe places pastorally - reindeer, goats, kangaroos etc.
I still think there's better use for that land than raising cattle on it. I can't help but think that good meat is reserved for the luxury of a few, that includes well raised organic meats. It's only the wealthy people that I know that can afford such.
Are you claiming cowboys are herding cattle in the streets of Manhattan? Or "everyone" wants to move to a cattle ranch in the middle of nowhere in Texas but they just don't know it yet? You could work your argument either direction but I don't think either will work very well. Farmers and ranchers like money just like anyone else. If they could subdivide their land to city slickers at SFO/SV square footage prices I think they would...