Python 2.6 and 2.7 each have a bad definition of the class RawConfigParser
It is immediately apparent in the __init__ function which begins with:

class RawConfigParser:
    def __init__(self, defaults=None, dict_type=dict):
        self._dict = dict_type
        self._sections = self._dict()
        self._defaults = self._dict()

Clearly, _dict() is not a function.  _dict is not even properly defined as a public or private member of the RawConfigParser class.

The fix is to add a private variable to the class and a function for retrieving the value.