> first-class.

I'm not sure I follow. This looks first-class to me.

  def name_printer(name):
      def printer():
          print(name)
      return printer

  erlanger_printer = name_printer('erlanger')

Python doesn't support creating anonymous functions, but functions are first-class. Sorry if you already knew this; it seems like you know Python pretty well so I'm sure you do.

Of course functions are first-class, and the lambda statement does return anonymous functions. Functions in Python are just objects that have a __call__ method, and methods are just functions partially-applied to the object they are bound on -- LOVELY METACIRCULARITY

What aren't first class are statements and suites (indented blocks of expressions) -- they're part of the syntax and thus can't be constructed or referred to. Particularly nasty is the way non-value-returning statements can't be used in expressions passed to other statements.

Your example is perfect -- in Python < 3, print is a statement and not a built-in function!

  # this is invalid syntax:
  name_printer = lambda x: lambda: print x
  
  # with print as a function it works:
  from __future__ import print_function
  name_printer = lambda x: lambda: print(x)

Nice explanation. Note that I did wrap my print arg in parens, however. When I heard they were changing it to a function in 3 I made this a habit.

Using parens that way with the print statement is a bad idea. You aren't using it like a function -- the parens are parsed as an expression.

                 statement   function
  print(1)       1           1
  print(1,2)     (1, 2)      1 2
  print(1,2), 3  (1, 2) 3    SyntaxError

Just use the old syntax, and let 2to3 take care of you when the time comes.

I don't think I've ever used print that way. If I need to print more than one thing, it's clearer to use regular string formatting. Thanks for clarifying that though, interesting.