Mize you are right about the ballast probably, but I don't know what is actually breaking there.
For your information when we moved I replaced all the incandescents with CFLs and only had CFLs fail in one light fixture over the 5 years.
I rewired that light eventually b/c it was hooked to some sketchy wiring and the lights quit failing. Anyway anecdotal evidence is anecdotal, but I have had good luck. There seems to be a lot of quality difference between various CFLs.
Where are you located? The US has notoriously bad power issues (90% of our powerlines are overhead wires that suffer weather issues - we didn't rebuild after WWII so we have that legacy). CFL ballasts have capacitors in them that likely degrade with time and transients. I suppose a whole-house surge system would help (they make them). The LED "ballast" is basically a resistor which is why they get so hot.