Current behavior:
Click somewhere in a paragraph and set a paragraph style or attributes and nothing happens. Paragraph attributes are only evaluated at the beginning of a paragraph. Inserts, moves and deletes cause style and attribute crud to accumulate, in some cases to the point where you get @P1:@P2:@P1 repeated. Or a paragraph attribute will cling to the end of a preceding paragraph.

Desired behavior:
When setting paragraph attributes they should be inserted at the beginning of the paragraph, regardless of where the text cursor is at, for any paragraph that has any of its text selected. Only the last paragraph attribute before the first text of the paragraph should remain.

In short, paragraph attributes should be inserted at the beginning of a paragraph and only the smallest applicable set of attributes/styles should remain.

I know this bug has been around forever, but long standing doesn't mean it isn't a bug.