How to compare times in Python?

You can't compare a specific point in time (such as "right now") against an unfixed, recurring event (8am happens every day).

You can check if now is before or after today's 8am:

>>> import datetime
>>> now = datetime.datetime.now()
>>> today8am = now.replace(hour=8, minute=0, second=0, microsecond=0)
>>> now < today8am
True
>>> now == today8am
False
>>> now > today8am
False

You can use the time() method of datetime objects to get the time of day, which you can use for comparison without taking the date into account:

>>> this_morning = datetime.datetime(2009, 12, 2, 9, 30)
>>> last_night = datetime.datetime(2009, 12, 1, 20, 0)
>>> this_morning.time() < last_night.time()
True

You can compare datetime.datetime objects directly

E.g:

>>> a
datetime.datetime(2009, 12, 2, 10, 24, 34, 198130)
>>> b
datetime.datetime(2009, 12, 2, 10, 24, 36, 910128)
>>> a < b
True
>>> a > b
False
>>> a == a
True
>>> b == b
True
>>>