"At running game, when there is little opportunity to check your zone of fire and you are very unlikely to make a clean kill anyway."

And I agree with that statement entirely. But what about at a running deer from a stand that you have been sitting on for hours and you know what is around you???

"Comparing a rifle shot at a deer with the shotgun blast at a rabbit or bird are a completely different matter all together" And how is that so different. Each is an animal running, each is being targetted by a hunter who knows his abilities. Using the above statement from International Hunters Association then hunting for small game and birds is a lot more unsafe than hunting deer from a stand. So you see there are definite interpretations for each type of hunting and how the shots are taken. Making a blanket statement that shooting at a running deer is bad is a bad statement to make and trying to justify that type of statement only leads to many able to prove its fallacy.