Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems similar to Sublime Text 2. Except for the part where you're stuck trying to decipher existing Emacs Lisp. With Python I find I can express what I'm trying to do without too much thought.
One of the things about emacs is its on almost every machine you can find accessible by terminal. Except when its not, which is why I know enough vi commands to do really simple things. (vi seems to be on every *nix machine without fail). I'll fully admit that the configuration and lisp scripts are confusing in emacs. Its almost too configurable. But they are amazingly powerful. Plus emacs has the indispensable (M-x…
I just wish it were easier to use it on my local machine in a terminal but still maintain a GUI version as well.