I have had a lot of post ideas the past couple of weeks, but I have also had an inoperative WordPress installation so I couldn't publish them.  After repeatedly impacting the keyboard with my forehead in frustration I found the following on the WordPress support forum

They [the files] need to be uploaded with an ftp client, in binary mode.

I checked my ftp client settings and sure enough I had been transferring my files using ASCII mode instead of binary mode.   UGH! Once I changed the settings and reloaded the WordPress files everything started working perfectly.  It feels good to be back in the saddle. - Sean