Python 2.6a0 (trunk:60565M, Feb  4 2008, 01:21:28) 
[GCC 4.0.1 (Apple Computer, Inc. build 5367)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> from compiler import parse
>>> parse("1;")
Module(None, Stmt([Discard(Const(1)), Discard(Const(None))]))

I did not expect the Discard(Const(None)).  Instead, I expected

Module(None, Stmt([Discard(Const(1))]))

What on earth is this about?

This really is a minor point.  I don't track the 3K list and I see now that the 
compiler module won't be in Python 3k - good riddance - so feel free to discard 
this as well as the other open compiler module bugs.

I want to experiment with adding instrumentation for branch coverage.  To do that I 
want to get the character ranges of each term in the AST.  The Python compiler 
module doesn't keep track of that so I'm developing a new parser based on PLY.

I've developed it and I'm now cross-checking the generated ASTs to verify they are 
identical.  In this case the compiler module generates an extra node in the AST so 
I had to add backwards compatibility support.

Marking this as Won't Fix.

I'd suggest looking at the _ast module
(http://docs.python.org/dev/library/_ast.html) as a reference rather
than the compiler module. The maintenance on the latter has been sketchy
at best, and as you note, it is scheduled for a well earned retirement
in 3.0.

Passing _ast.PyCF_ONLY_AST as a flag to the builtin function compile()
will let you get an AST using the actual runtime compiler, so any odd
nodes you find in there are likely to be there for a reason (e.g. None
is implicitly inserted into most function namespaces due to the implied
'return None' at the end of the function).