<SYSTEM_TASK:>
Solve the following problem using Python, implementing the functions described below, one line at a time
<END_TASK>
<USER_TASK:>
Description:

def _request(self, path, method, body=None):
        "Base request function"
        h = httplib2.Http()
        resp, content = h.request(
            self.base_url + path,
            method,
            body = json.dumps(body),
        )
        if resp['status'] == "200":
            return json.loads(content)
        else:
            raise IOError(
                "Got %s reponse from server (%s)" % (
                    resp['status'],
                    content,
                )
            )