watch live Burgum talked for about 53 minutes, almost exclusively about the state budget approved by the Legislature earlier this month. Joe Morrissette, director of the state Office of Management and Budget, talked, with frequent interruptions, for 5 minutes or so. I’m guessing. I didn’t have a stopwatch. Forty-five minutes into the meeting, Burgum’s press aide, Mike Nowatzki, suggested members of the editorial board might have questions. I asked one — the only one, it turned out. My question was about Burgum’s boast that North Dakota would be carbon neutral by the end of this decade, close enough that I may live to see it. He made the suggestion at last week’s Petroleum Conference in Bismarck. It was a strategic move. Burgum will need the cooperation of energy companies to make his boast a reality.