LinuxQuestions.org - ./configure error: what's wrong with these lines?

Here's the error messages:

Code:

checking for Python include path...  File "<string>", line 1

    import distutils.sysconfig;                                    print distutils.sysconfig.get_python_inc();

                                                                                ^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax



checking Python linker flags...  File "<string>", line 1

    from distutils.sysconfig import *;                      from string import join;                      print join(get_config_vars('VERSION'))

                                                                                                                    ^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

  File "<string>", line 1

    from distutils.sysconfig import *;                                    from string import join;                                    print '-L' + PREFIX + '/lib',                                    '-lpython';

                                                                                                                                              ^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

and these are the corresponding lines from configure:

Code:

  # Check for Python include path

  # if PYTHON_INCLUDES is set, do not do anything

  echo "\$PYTHON=$PYTHON"

  if test $python_found = yes; then

      { $as_echo "$as_me:${as_lineno-$LINENO}: checking for Python include path" >&5

$as_echo_n "checking for Python include path... " >&6; }



      if test -z "$PYTHON_INCLUDES"; then

          python_path=`$PYTHON -c "import distutils.sysconfig; \

                                  print distutils.sysconfig.get_python_inc();"`

          if test -n "${python_path}"; then

              python_path="-I$python_path"

          fi

          PYTHON_INCLUDES=$python_path

      fi



      { $as_echo "$as_me:${as_lineno-$LINENO}: result: $PYTHON_INCLUDES" >&5

$as_echo "$PYTHON_INCLUDES" >&6; }



  fi



  # Check for Python linker flags

  # if PYTHON_LIBS is set, do not do anything

  if test $python_found = yes; then

      { $as_echo "$as_me:${as_lineno-$LINENO}: checking Python linker flags" >&5

$as_echo_n "checking Python linker flags... " >&6; }



      if test "x$PYTHON_LIBS" = "x"; then

          # (makes two attempts to ensure we've got a version number

          # from the interpreter)

          py_version=`$PYTHON -c "from distutils.sysconfig import *; \

                      from string import join; \

                      print join(get_config_vars('VERSION'))"`

          if test "x$py_version" = "xNone"; then

              if test "x$PYTHON_VERSION" != "x"; then

                  py_version=$PYTHON_VERSION

              else

                  py_version=`$PYTHON -c "import sys; \

                              print sys.version[:3]"`

              fi

          fi



          PYTHON_LIBS=`$PYTHON -c "from distutils.sysconfig import *; \

                                  from string import join; \

                                  print '-L' + PREFIX + '/lib', \

                                  '-lpython';"`$py_version

      fi



      { $as_echo "$as_me:${as_lineno-$LINENO}: result: $PYTHON_LIBS" >&5

$as_echo "$PYTHON_LIBS" >&6; }



  fi

I know python is finicky about whitespace so I twiddled with that, but it did nothing. This is from a proper package tarball too.