"Tom" wrote in message
...
I got the telescope bug and went out and got one. After I figured out
which
end to point, I thought I'd check out some stars. Obviously, they look
the
same
magnified as they do with the naked eye. For some reason, I trained the
scope
to a reddish "star" that was down on the western horizon (of Phoenix
Arizona).
Looking at it through the scope, it was a perfectly round, whitish planet.
I thought
it might be Mars because of it's reddish hue, but through the scope it was
white.
Venus perhaps? This was last night (07-01-2004).

You need to look more closely if you think the stars look the same magnified
as they do with the naked eye Betelgeuse and Aldeberan (even Arcturus) are
clearly orange. Alberio (the head of Cygnus the swan) may look white to the
naked eye, but a telescope reveals it to be a lovely blue and gold.

You could have seen Mercury, Mars or Jupiter. If the disk was big, then it
was Jupiter. The disk of Mars is VERY tiny and Mercury goes through phases
like the moon.