Overcoming herpetophobia (or what's up w/ Python scopes)?

[Kent Johnson]

kj wrote:
> I'm a Perlhead (there, I said it).  Years ago I made a genuine
> attempt to learn Python, but my intense disappointed with the way
> Python deals with scopes ultimately sapped my enthusiasm.  I couldn't
> live without closures and without the fine control over scopes that
> Perl provides.

Python has supported nested (lexical) scopes and closures since version 2.1, maybe this gives you enough control; see
http://www.amk.ca/python/2.1/index.html#SECTION000300000000000000000

Kent