Ooh, I think you just stumbled across the Revolution's real name: The Nintendo Innuendo.
I find the touch screen control in Animal Crossing annoying, personally. I like using the stylus for just about everything in the game except moving. I just wish it was possible to smack people with the net without using the touch screen. Anyway, I hope (and I think it's reasonable to expect) that d-pad controls will exist in Phantom Hourglass. I do like that doing a spin attack is a simple matter of encircling Link, though. It's too hard to do a quick circle on the d-pad.