Those of you who remember the Cold War might still recall the wonderful field of study called Kremlinology. Which is reading the tea leaves to figure out what is happening behind "The Wall" by indirect signs - who is on the podium, which portrait was installed or removed and the like.

Google's megalomaniac ambition, arbitrary decision-making, obsession with secrecy and lack of basic transparency makes them too easy to compare with Kremlin. If not of Brezhnev's era, at least the Putinism of today (did you notice how Putin just fooled everyone with his new PM choice?).

So with my Googleologist hat on, let's look into Adam Bosworth story

First of all, the reaction to the news story from press and bloggers ran gamut between shock and sorrow. How can this be? What does this mean? Who will fix healthcare? The problem with inflated expectations is they put you in the position of having nowhere to go but down. Health technology media spent inordinate time building up hype for Google Health, Adam specifically and a few more companies I will not mention as white knights to come in and "save healthcare".

As recently as just two (!!!) months ago, I noted the irrational exuberance at Healthcare Unbound conference about how Google Health is going to take over the world (before shipping). Few in healthcare were brave enough to ask the hard questions, which are in my opinion pretty obvious. But I find it hard to blame any of my well-meaning friends. After all if you do not live in Silicon Valley and mingle in backstage with the hard-core Internet business crowd it is tempting to buy into glossy announcements.

So, how about we do a reality check and examine GOOG business?

Whatever Google talks about what they do, there is only one dominant cash stream paying the bills and it comes from selling keywords to the highest bidder (literally!!!). Everything else is about driving traffic and pardon me, window-dressing. So far Google was not very successful in developing alternative income streams. Keyword ads continued their run as the Internet grew, but last quarter was a modest miss that likely prompted departure of CFO Reyes.

I am no financial analyst, so I would rely on Henry Blodget (who learned his lesson as Merrill analyst in the last bubble) to explain what happens to Google as the mortgage market dominoes fall and the financial services ad spend dries up - check out a dozen posts with in depth analysis! But to the outsiders Google indeed looks invulnerable. Just like Yahoo was in 1999.

The factors that made Google succeed in search advertising work against it in health. The very public spat about selling keywords to fight Moore's Sicko and undercutting the humanitarian perspective of Adam's group is no accident. The dirty little secret is Google already making tons of money from health, in what my friend John Mack calls "bAdWords". Pushing this model of selling ads against other people's content (your medical record) is unlikely to be well-received, no matter who is on the Health Advisory Council.

So in my view, Google took a hard look at who is buttering their bread and decided to focus there. I am a little amused by Scott Shreeve's call on Marissa Mayer to be transparent and boldly embrace "Health 2.0". Marissa's job is not to fix healthcare, it is to figure out how to drive traffic and make money in Google's bread and butter search business. She would take the side of anti-Sicko advertisers any day and her plate of legal issues is already full with YouTube.

So it is natural for Google to do a little house-cleaning with Health solutions being the most obvious candidate for the chopping block

Special mention is to the notion of "partnering with Google". The moment the company decided that search is not enough and started to expand to non-core markets, many people suddenly realized that Google is coming for their bacon. Ask how people feel about Google in Hollywood, among the book publisher ranks and now among medical librarians. Google is increasingly viewed as Kremlin - a superpower not shy about imposing its will anywhere in the world. They have no choice to keep their growth rate and keep their stock up. That is until the streak breaks that might come sooner than we think.

Why people expect healthcare industry to turn PHR / EHR over to Google is beyond me. Only time before they see how Google works.

Finally I should note that great empires usually collapse from internal decay rather than outside invasion. This could make comparison of "Don't Be Evil" Empire with Kremlin even more apt. People who built Google are cashing out and are replaced with more conventional folk. In a time-honored Silicon Valley tradition the defectors are putting themselves hard at work to compete with the mothership and turn their noses on acquisition offers.

Why should Adam Bosworth put up with bureaucracy in service of keyword ad Gods, when he has much greater value on his own?

Google is certainly not going away, but it is pointless to partner with them on health products until they prove some humility and openness. Microsoft and Yahoo learned this long ago, but Google is still acting like adolescent. Roman generals were required to listen to "memento mori" incantation during their Triumphs. Google's board would be wise to tell management the same thing.

So be careful what you believe about Google's much-ballyhooed world domination of healthcare. They are mortals too.