I found that this problem goes away when I unset my PYTHONPATH environment variable. I had a module in that path named 'sip' that caused a collision with /usr/lib/pymodules/python2.6/sip.so, and once I removed that things worked okay.
-- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org