Why is my AVCHD footage jerky in iMovie?

Can someone help me with the following problem:
I have filmed a number of videos with my Canon Vixia HF10 and when I import them into iMovie the footage get slightly jerky especially when panning or zooming.
In the setup of my camcorder the frame rate had been set to 60- by mistake.
My camcorder uses NTSC.
At the import in iMovie the frame rate of the footage became set to NTSC 30.
When I later render my videos and burned them to a DVD and watched it on TV, I could see jerky panning.
What happens with the quality of the footage when the frame rate changes from NTSC 60- to NTSC 30 at the import to iMovie?
Why do I get jerky footage when panning?
I have a big number of videos with these problems from a two months vacation, so I would be very thankful if someone could give me some help.

Thanks Appleman,
the info isn't under properties in IM 08, but in preferences it's set to PAL. I popped into an Apple store today, and they were very helpful - they let me download some sample footage into iMovie 11 - and it's the same, so a newer version of iMovie isn't the answer. They have kept the footage for analysis, and will get back to me. They suspect the codec in iMovie might not suit my camera precisely, and will look for a better one. This might mean using Final Cut Express, but I'll report back when I know more.

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My destination is a standard definition DVD, and as quick as possible. I found that at the moment the quickest way to burn the final edited project is by using a stand-alone DVD recorder. That's why i thought plugging the computer to the DVD recorder with the display-out, will do the job.
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