Fellow Americans, we come to you before the President’s big speech (aka State of the Union, dating back to George Washington) to lay out the Taxpayers for Common Sense vision for the State of the Union. There’s lots to cover, but we’re focusing on budget, tax, and spending.

Our vision is one of fiscal common sense. In our vision, federal taxpayers shouldn’t be asked to pay for programs that don’t work, that don’t achieve stated goals, that don’t make sense, create unwarranted subsidies or corporate welfare, are corrupt, create long-term taxpayer liabilities, or that cost more than they should. We lay out for you our version of the should be in the President’s speech, with our special watch-doggery spin.

First, no one can ignore what is happening in Ukraine. Nor should they. It is a terrible situation. We expect that there will be an emergency supplemental spending request from the Pentagon to support the previously unbudgeted movement of troops into and within Europe and possibly other expenditures. That request must be limited and targeted and not some grab bag. These actions should not trigger a resurrection of that old slush fund the Overseas Contingency Operations account. Just, no.

Even before the shooting war started, the situation in Ukraine was roiling markets and sending gas prices rising. But we cannot afford to take knee-jerk, bumper sticker approaches to big policy issues. A gas tax holiday would not help people much at the tank, but it would sink the Highway Trust Fund – a main source of road repair and construction dollars – deeper into the red and lead to more dollars taken from the Treasury. Tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve – not gonna cut it. The President needs to be clear, the markets and sanctions are going to have real effects and false quick fixes today lead to big costs and consequences in the future.

Of course, the discussion of oil prices leads into a discussion of oil and gas, but also climate impacts of relying on these energy sources (which is a huge source of strength for Russia and other oil producing regions). Recognizing the real-world costs and global-political impacts, the best place to start would be cutting the costly and counterproductive federal subsidies for fossil fuel companies. The entrenched interests will use every opportunity – including the fighting in Ukraine – to claim that now is not the time for reform. The truth is that ending their lucrative tax breaks and reforming leasing on federal lands for oil and gas development will have no impact on the global price of oil or total U.S. supply. It will however raise billions of dollars badly needed by states and the federal Treasury.

Wins for the climate are desperately needed, and fast. The enormous and accelerating effects of climate change will threaten the country’s finances more than most anything else in the coming years. The increasing regularity and severity of natural disasters demonstrates the challenge. Before 2008, we had endured nine billion-dollar disasters in a single year just once. Since then, we’ve had eight such years, including every year since 2016. Not surprisingly, our disaster spending has steadily increased. But that represents only a fraction of the costs imposed by climate change. Claims made of the National Flood Insurance Program are rising, as are the armed forces’ costs to protect our bases and assets around the globe.

What the union doesn’t need is false solutions – wasted subsidies for biodiesel, ethanol, nuclear, carbon capture and storage (CCS), and other false climate solutions. We’ve been around long enough that we remember President Bush standing before Congress in 2006 promising that cellulosic biofuels derived from wood chips and switchgrass would come online in just six years. Going on two decades later, the U.S. has little to show despite the government mandating biofuels use, plus billions in subsidies. Rather than doubling down on past mistakes, the U.S. should point investments toward agricultural conservation programs, for instance, with proven, documentable, and verifiable benefits. A win-win for the climate instead of another handout to special interests.

Finally, the President can take somewhat of a victory lap on the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (formerly known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Framework). That said, he must also push for those expenditures to be prioritized to fix existing infrastructure before new construction and to prioritize investments so that taxpayers get the biggest bang for their taxpayer buck. It goes without saying that he will push the Build Back Better plan, but that package is facing a winding road in coming months.

There’s so much more that we can – and could – cover (but would you read?). What America needs is the President to rightfully say, the state of the union is good, but we could make it better by tackling some of the real challenging issues confronting it, including Ukraine and the Russian invasion, but also how to tackle the pandemic in a morally and fiscally responsible way, face the existential threat that is climate change, and go about spending tax dollars in a responsible way.