Off the top of my head:
The 7mm bullet in general sits in a pretty sweet spot. You can get a high BC without having to go too heavy a bullet, so recoil is kept in check. But heavy enough for good penetration on bigger game. And there are lots of bullet options available. And a 7mm-08 rifle with, say a 1:9.5 twist, can handle bullets from 100 to 160 grains. Small game, varmints, deer, antelope, sheep, hog, elk, steel silhouettes and long-range paper are all viable targets. It's a very versatile cartridge.
With the right load, it can shoot nearly as flat as a SD-matched .260 Remington and deliver nearly as much energy, but do so with more momentum, which means more penetration on game. Or that that steel ram is more likely to fall.
In a .308-based case, the 7mm bullet is just about perfect, and it's a very efficient cartridge. The case has enough boiler room to push high-BC 6.5mm and 7mm bullets effectively, but might struggle pushing .308 bullets with the same BC and/or SD. At the same time, it's not so overbore that barrel wear isn't the concern that it is with the .243.
And all this in a short action...