Charlie,
The QUOTED_IDENTIFIER connection setting should affect what you seeing. With QUOTED_IDENTIFIER OFF, you should be able to delimit string using double-quotes. When QUOTED_IDENTIFIER is ON, all strings delimited with double-quotes are intrepreted as identifiess, such as tables, columns, stored procedures, etc.
For example, with QUOTED_IDENTIFIER ON, you can run this query
USE Northwind
SELECT * FROM "order details"
There's an option within the SQL Server ODBC DSN editor to set this connection string, you might want to see if that's where you're running into problems.
-Mike