Yeah, no kidding. Blame Eisner. I am about halfway through DisneyWar right now and the things that guy did to satisfy his own ego and consolidate his power base, even at the expense of the fiscal health of the company, are just astounding. He was even willing to ruin lifelong friendships over these types of things.
I've only started to get a glimpse of what Iger was like in the early days post-merger, but it's interesting how he went from a perceived threat by Eisner to his right-hand man. Probably because it seems that Iger was equally shameless in promoting Eisner's plans, if it meant that he was going to get ahead in the company. And as we all know, the real crown jewel (from a shareholder perspective anyway) at Disney is ESPN, and Iger came from Cap Cities/ABC, so he probably knew how to use that as leverage.