I bought a new deer rifle a few years ago, and ended up with a Ruger Hawkeye stainless laminated in ... .308. A .30-06 would have fit the bill as well, but I already have an M1 Garand and didn't want to have high performance rounds about that could possibly end up in the Garand and bend an op rod.
From what I can tell, with standard factory loads there is really not much difference between the two. If you hand load, you can approach 7MM Rem Mag levels of performance with the .30-06. Not so with the .308. If I need to hunt something that requires more power than a .308 I have a .338 win mag.
