Likely Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Barack Obama is using the Internet to counter criticism he's moving too far to the political center, observers say.

The Illinois senator was the target of intense criticism from disappointed liberal supporters on his social networking site, Mybarackobama.com, when he shifted his stance to support a bill granting immunity to U.S. telecommunications companies that allowed the White House to monitor telephone calls without a warrant.

But in a sign of his comfort with the sometimes harsh political give-and-take of the Internet, Obama jumped onto the site himself and defended his actions, the San Jose Mercury News reported Sunday.

I'm happy to take my lumps, he wrote, adding, I'm certainly not perfect, and expect to be held accountable too.

It's not the only instance of Obama being criticized by liberal supporters who see him shifting to the center on such issues as Iraq, gun control and the death penalty, and he risks alienating his core voters, one observer told the newspaper.

If Obama shifts too much, then he runs the risk of being seen as an opportunist and flip-flopper, said Steve Schier, a political scientist at Carleton College in Minnesota.

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