It looks like using Visual Studio 2010 it is possible to build against the 2008 runtime, if you have both editions installed: Can I use Visual Studio 2010's C++ compiler with Visual Studio 2008's C++ Runtime Library?
Is it possible to do this using just the free Windows Platform SDKs and VS 2010? Just to stress - installing Visual Studio 2008 is not an option.
Background: I'd like to build a Python module for Python 2.7. I have a copy of Visual Studio 2010, but Python 2.7 (specifically the Python(x,y) distribution) is built using 2008. Rebuilding Python, or rebuilding Python(x,y) is not something I want to get into (there are various other modules I want to use as well). My module needs to link against vendor-supplied libraries built using VS 2008/2010 (I've been given both sets of libraries). I don't own a copy of Visual Studio 2008, and I really don't want to have to buy one.