>>> import datetime,time
>>> stringDate = "2006-05-18 19:35:00"
>>> dt = datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp(time.mktime(time.strptime(stringDate,"%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")))
>>> print dt
2006-05-18 19:35:00
>>> print type(dt)
<type 'datetime.datetime'>
>>>
#//python/835