The Obama Tax Hike

Everyone is up in arms about the Obama tax increase for 2011.  Am I missing something?  Isn't he pretty much returning taxes to Regan-era levels at a point at which were going to have to generate some revenue to compensate for the counter-cyclical spending?  What else would you do?  What is the alternative?  I think the attempts to describe this as class warfare are simply rhetorical nonsense.