Bogus astronomy in the news [UFOs]

Apparently there were some unusual lights in the sky Wednesday in the
San Francisco Bay Area. I didn't see them but this article about them
appeared in this morning's San Francisco Chronicle:

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/10/28/MNG8EFF0FQ15.DTL

The chairman of the astronomy department at Foothill College claims
"the
lights were probably Mars and Venus."

The event occurred nearly at midnight, Wednesday, October 26, 2005.

My response to the Science Editor of the SF Chronicle included:

" At Midnight Wednesday, Mars was at 57 degrees elevation to the ESE
" (actually 122 degrees azimuth) and Venus had set 3.5 hours earlier
" to the West and was 38 degrees below the horizon (i.e., not visible).
"
" Below is a solar system data table view produced by software I've
been
" using for 15 years now (and so accurate I use it to find the
positions
" of Mars' moons for observing, among other things) and I've been an
" amateur astronomer for over 50 years.
"
" A statement like "the lights were probably Mars and Venus" is one of
" the reasons I've never joined the Peninsula Astronomical Society
though
" I've lived here (Los Altos, which hosts Foothill College) 40 years.
"
" For what it's worth, I didn't see the lights Wednesday due to the
" overcast conditions in the South Peninsula.
"
" Thad
"
" Az Alt Air Size VMag RisTm TrnTm TrnAlt SetTm
HrsUp
" Sun 331:08:40 -62:52:09 13.33 1931 -27 7:29 12:52 40:00 18:15
10:47
" Moon 48:55:06 -21:58:43 13.33 1766 -11 1:10 8:26 70:59 15:31
14:21
" Mercury 287:46:20 -56:19:29 13.33 5.9 -0.1 9:25 14:18 31:07 19:11
9:46
" Venus 263:16:31 -37:58:15 13.33 23.4 -4.2 11:30 16:04 26:12 20:38
9:08
" Mars 122:40:43 57:36:15 1.18 20.1 -2.2 18:58 1:57 69:05 8:50
13:52
" Jupiter 339:07:11 -61:48:49 13.33 30.6 -1.5 7:11 12:41 42:08 18:10
10:59
" Saturn 60:40:09 -7:16:58 13.33 18.1 0.3 0:42 7:41 70:41 14:40
13:59
" Uranus 226:37:58 30:08:03 1.99 3.4 5.8 15:50 21:22 43:00 2:58
11:08
" Neptune 239:00:47 11:12:21 5.03 2.1 7.9 14:45 19:55 36:09 1:09
10:24
" Pluto 272:57:51 -30:08:29 13.33 0.3 14.0 11:03 16:16 37:05 21:29
10:26
"
" Center Equ: Topo 2000.0 10/26/2005 23:59:59 PDT:
"
" Lat: 37:20:17
" Long: 122:04:17
" Elev: 78.1m
" Temp: 10C
" Pres: 1010.04mB
" Site: ThadLABS, Los Altos CA