I just downloaded Windows Live Essential Writer 2012.  I can connect to my Wordpress Blog and download existing posts into Writer.
However, when I publish the post back to Wordpress,  the "<", ">" and "&" are stripped.  For example, in the source of  Writer:

<p>The stairs are now stained and protected with 3 layers of semi-gloss sealer.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<table style="width: 100%" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="0">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="60%"><em>Stairs to basement.</em></td>

<tr>
<td valign="top"><em>Stairs to upper level.</em></td>
</tr></tbody></table>

After published, on my Wordpress blog, it becomes:
pThe stairs are now stained and protected with 3 layers of semi-gloss sealer./p pnbsp;/p pnbsp;/p table style="width: 100%" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="0" tbody tr td valign="top" width="60%"emStairs to basement./em/td /tr tr td valign="top"emStairs to upper level./em//tr/tbody/table

Anyone can help me out is much appreciated!!