Several of the questions that you raise are answered in the forum FAQ, especially the question of the public money on games. You should really start there before starting a thread, there's a ton of good sports betting info in there:
Books do not try to balance their action, that is a common sports betting myth. Your roulette analogy is exactly what goes on -- the books take unbalanced action because they have a pretty significant hold back on lines and they win over time from most people. Books adjust lines because doing so allows them to adjust their risk profiles, not to try to attract balanced action.
Strategies like universally fading the public are not as large of a winner as you think. Very few easy and simple such systems work.
-P