The design doc doesn't say "simple", it says "efficient". I think "simpler" would have been a stronger argument. While using <> would make the parser more comp

The design doc doesn't say "simple", it says "efficient". I think "simpler" would have been a stronger argument. While using <> would make the parser more complex, I have a hard time seeing that making a meaningful performance difference in a compilation context. Maybe if you're parsing a lot of Go without actually compiling it, but that doesn't seem like a use case to optimize for.