In regards to your second paragraph, power in America is heavily concentrated towards rural Americans in sparsely populated states, especially at the national level, because of institutions such as the Senate and the electoral college making it rather difficult to get large legislation passed.
I wouldn’t call it helpless, there’s been a fair amount of political energy in America since its beginning.
In my second paragraph, I'm not even speaking about federal political power. The observation holds for municipal, county, and state-level political power - none of which have anything to do with the electoral college.
As a large city dweller for my entire adult life that does not bother me, but it isn't a sustainable process without those economic engines external to them.
Otherwise I'd argue the reverse. Banking, media, software etc. seem to export wealth from smaller communities back to urban centers. In this regard large urban centers can be regarded something as absentee landlords receiving grapes and oil and Amish furniture and exporting spreadsheets and compliance audits.
The difference is that city-dwellers are more economically productive (For various reasons, some of which are systemic), and, after paying for all those things, are left with a surplus at the end of the year.
Not to mention that the cost of supplying more mundane, necessary-for-life goods to rural areas is higher, due to higher distances, and the inefficiencies of serving low-density markets. This is another thing that keeps rural areas poor.
Or rather purchasing?
What I can describe it as, is helpless. Instead of seizing it's political power to improve their lot, most of the people at the bottom of it are either apathetic to politics, or are politically distracted by a culture war.