Hoist by his own petar = lifted by his own … ah … explosive bodily gasses (presumably: having one’s character revealed by one’s unpleasant deeds; not necessarily: being destroyed by one’s own actions)

This is much like Olbermann trying to sound smart by using a pseudo Shakespearean quote and then looking a bit silly when people figure out he doesn’t understand the quote.

Blow them at the moon? One can only shake his head and chuckle.

Quote usage and phrase usage are as important as word usage. [I see a future topic for our training manual--unless you beat us to it!]

“heist (slang) v.t. To steal or rob; — n. A robbing or theft esp. an armed hold up, or a particularly clever or spectacular theft: one who robs or steals — n. heister [Variant of hoist]” – Chambers Dictionary

Cool.

My Chamber calls petard (Shakespeare’s ‘petar’) “a case containing explosives, used for blowing in doors, etc.” [from Old French 'peter' to crack, explode, from Latin petere, to break wind.]” and refers to hoise.

Under “hoise (archaic usage)” is the explanation I recall from Junior high, “Hoist with his own petard – blown up with his own explosive, caught in his own trap [Perhaps from Old Dutch hijssen; Dutch hijschen, to hoist]”

BTW – did ‘ij’ just kind of merge into the modern letter ‘y’?

And then “hoisting” is Scottish – same as “hosting”. Cool.