So.. IF I would buy the argument that leading/trailing spaces are evil: How would the expression triple in size by exclusing those? And more important: Why is

So.. IF I would buy the argument that leading/trailing spaces are evil: How would the expression triple in size by exclusing those? And more important: Why is that relevant in any way? An article about maximum password length presents a quote that reads like "that's over our maximum regex length". Certainly no big deal, but I can't help raising my eyebrows at that line of reasoning..