Hi,

This looks impressive. You should really work from the current SVN
trunk, not from the 2.5 sources, as there were some additions to the re
module (mainly, a bytecode verifier contributed by Google).

Also, if it can be split into several functionally independent patches,
it will certainly help reviewing and (perhaps) integrating.

Last remark: we are currently in the last phases of the release process
for 2.6 and 3.0, so your work will probably not get a lot of attention
in the next few weeks. Don't be discouraged though!