Scientists discover a big threat to global warming

Would it limit the greenhouse gas emissions enough to have a worthwhile effect (and would farmers be amicable to the short term drop in profits suffered while the supply-side economics forces prices up?)

I wasn't referring so much to the effects of grazing on the pastures (though they can be detrimental, cattle generally are, as you said, a bit more gentle on them), but rather if the whole concern is the greenhouse gas emissions driving climate change - one of the prevailing models I have seen on climate prediction shows the "breadbasket" of America becoming increasingly arid and, eventually, desert-like - at which point there wouldn't be anything there for cattle to graze on.

Aye, which is why I responded with other such mythical creatures as clean coal and safe oil

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- I should have included unicorns and pixie dust as well, my bad

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Well, it would do three things.
1) Greatly reduce the number of cows in general because there's just not that much grazing in the US (most cattle in the US are feedlot-finished.)
2) Greatly improve digestive health. Cows evolved as herbivores to eat grass; in feedlots they are fed high calorie non-plant diets. This diet includes expired chewing gum, waste from candy factories, restaurant slops (including animal fat) and fillers like chicken feathers, sawdust and paper. This sort of diet messes with the flora in their guts and results in a lot more methane being released.
3) Greatly reduce the amount of antibiotics administered to cows. These have a negative effect on gut flora as well, of course; the resulting gut flora (after the antibiotics and the diet) look nothing like normal bovine flora, and generally generate a lot more methane.

 

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Looks like it's not just cows we should be worried about:

Alarm as study reveals world’s tropical forests are huge carbon emission source

 

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Cows are a bigger factor than what? Cows are a product of fossil fuels.