Based on what you have here it looks as though there is just some formatting that is applied to the editor on your update page. The reason I think this is because of the way the html is when you try to update.
This:
html:
<span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS;">
Was changed and looks like this:
html:
<span sans="" comic="" style="">
Since these are not attributes that are listed in the original html but are listed as attribute values this tells me that the information is being sent to the editor correctly but that some formatting that is applied is rewriting things. Check the default value of your iRite instance to see if there is any formatting applied to it. If you cannot tell post back with the code on your page for the iRite instance, it should look something like this:
php:
<?php
// WebAssist iRite: Rich Text Editor for Dreamweaver
$WARichTextEditor_1 = CreateRichTextEditor ("test", "WA_iRite/", "100%", "200px", "Default", "../custom/test_test1.js", "");
?>
