" the web can enable democracy by bringing interested people together to debate and respond to specific issues. Rapid, high quality, and grass roots it showed the future of how government’s could actually interact effectively with their citizens."

Well. You're assuming the government—any government—is interested in the democratic process. Only the most painfully naive would think that. Governments are not interested in interacting with citizens, they are interested in maintaining power at whatever cost. Why do you think they spend so much on getting re-elected?

Democracy, since, oh, Winston Churchill perhaps, is anathema to governments.