i got it to work by changeing ITEM_DEVICE="${INT_CARD}" but auto login didn't work and the up/down movements with the stylus were reversed. followed born2wonder's comments to fix reverse up/down and tap click:

apt-get remove xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-synaptics
apt-get install xserver-xorg-input-tslib=0.0.5-1mer7 libgtkstylus xsession-gtkstylus

then added to the /etc/gdm/gdm.conf-custom

[daemon]
AutomaticLoginEnable=true
AutomaticLogin=justin

but now the boot menu won't get past the "starting linuxrc" screen. did i do something wrong? i didn't think either of these 2 changes would prevent ubuntu from booting. i formated the ext3 partition again and started from the begining of the 2.2 instructions but still couldn't get past the linuxrc boot menu screen.