What Happened to Translation in Android?

When you select non-english text in Android, the first option in the context menu is Translate with the Google logo. You would assume this brings up Google translate. But pressing this option in fact just opens a Google search for "translate XXX" where XXX is whatever text you selected. No translation widget appears on the search result page and I don't actually get a translation unless I click one of the links (which look like spam in the language I'm translating).

Has it always been like this? Why doesn't the translate button actually link to their translation service?