June 2, 2004-I am getting sick of all the talk about a minority government.

I guess the pundits and journalists have to speculate about something, anything, even the most unlikely of possibilities, while they wait for the parties to reveal their platforms. After all, it is only Week One of the campaign. Hence the focus on the polling oracles. Yawn City.

High school history lessons show that a Conservative minority or a Liberal minority are both a long shot. Pollsters and pundits alike need a reality check: Canadians like majorities because they are stable, predictable and forgettable.

Canadian voters like majority governments and the first-past-the-post system delivers. In our 137-year history, Canada has had 37 majority governments and just eight minority governments. According to www.parl.gc.ca, a minority government in Canada lasts an average of 1 year, 5 months and 27 days.

In effect, a minority government would result in another election next year. So what's the point of electing a minority government, when you'll just have go back to the polls? Canadians want more democracy, but more elections is a case of quantity over quality.

Swallowing the "analysis" being offered in today's newspapers is even more difficult. After all, Chretien's second term (1997-2000) had a bare majority - just 155 seats of the 301 available. That's likely to happen this time, too.

The appeal of the minority government to the anti-Liberals is simple. It is the wet dream of parties who have no hope of assuming power, but want cheap and easy influence. Some so-called opinion leaders even seem to be trying to educate voters on how to elect a minority government. Of course, no one knows how to do it and Canadian voters are not utopic.

A minority government is Canadian democracy's equivalent of an accidental child. These accidents have yielded occasional happy results for ordinary Canadians, such as social services.

However, the most appealing aspect of a minority government is that it forces accountability. Most of the rhetoric in this campaign is about accountability - through free votes, modest dinner bills, ethics commissioners, and fairly-bid projects. Yet this type of accountability is little more than bean-counting.

True accountability is having to share power and knowing that lies and backroom deals can result in the government's collapse. Prime Ministers Martin, Chretien, Campbell, Mulroney, Trudeau and Clark all thought they alone could call the shots. Campbell, Mulroney and Clark all paid for it. Trudeau stick-handled his minority into a majority. And Chretien handed Martin his legacy - angry voters.

I often hear people say compromise is a Canadian trait. When I look at today's political parties, however, I see none interested in compromising their struggle for power. Each one is seeking to polarize people and force them into voting one way: their way. None of them want a minority government. They want power.

For Canadian politicians, compromise is the voter's job.