Matt Yglesias has an amazing graph:
So, over the next 10 years, the catfood commission plan would increase public debt when compared to current law (assuming Bush tax cuts expire). Yglesias comments:
Obviously starting around 2020 or so Bowles-Simpson starts doing better than current law, but it’s difficult for the current congress to tie the hands of future congress. After all, the whole point of the “alternative fiscal scenario” baseline is that past law doesn’t bind the hands of the current congress. The AFS [CBO Alternative Fiscal Scenario] is preferred my many as more politically realistic than the current law baseline, which is fair enough. But wouldn’t it be easier politically to stick with current law than to do Simpson-Bowles’ huge series of unpopular changes? After all, the American political system has a ton of veto points. Barack Obama saying “I will veto any laws that increase the deficit relative to current law” would do more to reduce the debt over the next 2 or 6 years than would adopting Simpson-Bowles.
Obama would actually have to start vetoing any of those laws for that kind of threat to work, as we've seen how effective his threats to Republicans have been for the past two years, but aside from that, increasing the debt burden over the next decade, coupled with slim chances for economic recovery in the next few years, doesn't make sense.