Obviously, Targeting is a controversial penalty and enforcement is inconsistent to say the least. One of the many aspects that bothers me about it, is the number of times the ball carrier sees the imminent impact and lowers his head into the path of the tackler's helmet thereby initiating the helmet to helmet contact that draws the flag. This seems patently unfair to the tackler as he initiated a move that was legal, but it was made illegal by the last second actions of the ball carrier. This typically seems to come when the tackler approaches significantly from the side and the ball carrier ducks head into the tackler's helmet that was originally going to impact or even just pass by his chest area. This results in an impact to the side of the skull, something it is really not that good at handling. I'm afraid the possible "reward" of drawing a targeting call against a defender could ironically result in an increase of head injuries of the ball carriers for this reason. Occasionally I've heard commentators mention this in passing but not give it any real consideration, so I thought I'd turn to the wisdom of TNet for further enlightenment.
We could have an hour long discussion on what is wrong with the targeting rule. One of the big problems,as you stated, is that the player on offense can 'cause' a targeting call. This year, however,they have expanded the targeting to include any hits the defensive player makes with his head no matter where he contacts the offensive player. When the offensive player moves, ducks, or dives at the last second the defense can't make the move needed to avoid getting the targeting call.