Here again!
Well do be more specific, targeting a link to open in a new window violates the W3C/WAI Web Content Accessibility Guidelines [1], and (if you're in the United States or other country with comparable anti-discrimination legislation) is quite possibly illegal under federal civil rights law.
Radical changes of focus in a GUI environment are extremely disorienting to blind users who are navigating by screen reader, and thus can be considered discrimination against the visually impaired.
Opening a link in a new window also breaks the back' button on the browser, preventing back-tracking in navigation.
It also bypasses the tabbed navigation in Galeon and Mozilla, irritating users of that feature.
If your user wants to open the link in a new window, he or she can do so quite easily with most browsers; there is no need to force the issue.
It's about leaving the user the freedom to navigate in the way that works best for him or her.
It's not unusual for a designer never to have thought about such issues; that's why we have the WCAG to point out to us things we might otherwise overlook. Or?
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