Get UTC time in seconds
You say you're using:
time.asctime(time.localtime(date_in_seconds_from_bash))where date_in_seconds_from_bash is presumably the output of date +%s.
The time.localtime function, as the name implies, gives you local time.
If you want UTC, use time.gmtime() rather than time.localtime().
As JamesNoonan33's answer says, the output of date +%s is timezone invariant, so date +%s is exactly equivalent to date -u +%s. It prints the number of seconds since the "epoch", which is 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC. The output you show in your question is entirely consistent with that:
date -uThu Jul 3 07:28:20 UTC 2014date +%s1404372514 # 14 seconds after "date -u" commanddate -u +%s1404372515 # 15 seconds after "date -u" command