I understand why they did this... but they really shouldn't have. It will only prolong the lifespan of 2.7.x...
The current planed end of life for 2.7.x is 2020, so this release doesn't change things. A previous HN discussion on this from earlier this year was at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7581434 .
The original plan was to support it at least until 2015. Then they (sort of) extended it. So even according to the original plan, this release is not surprising. If we get another release one year from now, that will be interesting news. Personally, I bet it will happen. Look how long 2.6 lasted. Almost exacly 5 years: 2.6.0 came out October 2008, while 2.6.9 came out 5 years later in October 2013.
There are numerous people using python for science who just won't acknowledge python3 exists, and if they stop updating python2, oh boy. Not good.