They may not succeed but this is indeed the purpose of the movie--to deconstruct an icon of the white male hegemony. As I understand it, the movie actually is not about cowboys at all but sheep-herders. Yet the persistence of this distortion to "cowboy" in the media is proof that the movie's agenda is to target the image of the free, masculine, independent American man.
Another way of putting it, for gutsier freepers is, the Hollywoodies want to castrate George Bush and this movie is as close as they can get.