like zip but with these properties:
  - returns a list, rather than an iterator. This is the old Python2 zip behavior.
  - a guarantee that all arguments are the same length.
  (normal zip silently drops entries to make them the same length)

def safe_zip(*args):
  """like zip but with these properties:
  - returns a list, rather than an iterator. This is the old Python2 zip behavior.
  - a guarantee that all arguments are the same length.
  (normal zip silently drops entries to make them the same length)
  """
  length = len(args[0])
  if not all(len(arg) == length for arg in args):
    raise ValueError("Lengths of arguments do not match: "
                     + str([len(arg) for arg in args]))
  return list(zip(*args))