" I have had issued a directive prohibiting the NSC staff itself from undertaking covert operations - no "ifs, " "ands, " or "buts.

CNN: Iran-Contra Affair

They were further irked by the operations bosses in Oak Brook, Illinois, who had issued an 80-page directive, called "Franchise 2000, " that tied a lot of new and onerous regulations to mandatory store reviews.

FORBES: Beyond burgers

There are questions however about how effective this directive will be in facilitating competition, because the two incumbents with the biggest cable operations, Deutsche Telekom (DT) and British Telecommunications, have already announced their plans to divest their cable operations.

CNN: EU: Telcos must spin off cable nets