If LWP and Net::FTP are failing, but the command line tools are working, try this command in a CPAN shell.

o conf dontload_hash "{ 'Net::FTP' => 1, 'LWP::UserAgent' => 1 }"
[download]

This should make it skip the perl modules and jump right to the command line tools.

My next step would probably be to reinstall LWP and Net::FTP. Perhaps newer versions or a reinstall will fix the issues you are having. Or, just be happy with wget, ncftpget, and lynx.

~J

Update: Don't forget to do a o conf commit to save the CPAN config changes for future sessions.