1. a governor of a province in ancient Persia 2. a ruler 3. a subordinate bureaucrat or official

David Remnick clearly intended the third meaning of this word in his New Yorker article: “No one, not even the most loyal satrap, was safe from Bush’s rages—no his close adviser Karl Rove, or Vice-President Dick Cheney, or Andrew Card, the chief of staff. ‘The only person escaping blame,’ one source explained, ‘is the President himself.'”