str.strip([chars])
Return a copy of the string with the leading and trailing characters removed. The chars argument is a string specifying the set of characters to be removed. If omitted or None, the chars argument defaults to removing whitespace. The chars argument is not a prefix or suffix; rather, all combinations of its values are stripped:

>>>
>>> ' spacious '.strip()
'spacious'
>>> 'www.example.com'.strip('cmowz.')
'example'