RE: sniper accuracy
Most military and police snipers, or sharpshooters, use the Remington 700, specially made with bedded synthetic stock, bull barrel and target trigger in .308 caliber, using 165 grain match grade bullets. Military snipers practice regularly out to 1000+ yards. Police snipers only shoot about 70 yards on the average in situations, but practice out to whatever their facilities will allow. In almost every case, they strive for 1/4" groups at 100 yards, and regularly get them. There was some experimentation with the .300 Winchester Magnum but found that on human targets, there was no real advantage to it, and the recoil was not as manageable as the .308. Some of the military now have specialized snipers that use a special 50 caliber rifle. These however are not your typically thought of snipers as these guns are far to heavy, usually in the vacinity of 20-25 lbs with huge muzzle brakes on them, to hump thru the bush. They have exceptional range and will shoot thru darn near anything though.