Blender can display normals. In the properties panel scroll down to mesh display and click on the little cubes under the word Normals: it displays vertexs and faces.
You can turn the imported faces into Ngons select vertices edges or face (X dissolve)
I find the default material that imports into blender with an OBJ is annoying but you can delete it.
I have also found importing a STL into blender is easier to deal with than an OBJ. just because of the material that is assigned to the mesh. It is easy to turn the tri's into quads (ALT-J)
to make normals consistent Ctrl-N

Oh yes, if you use blender 2.49 the OBJ importer imports the Ngons correctly (as seen in moi export preview window).