[Christ]

Yeah, I'm sure those things are illegal as well.

I don't think it's illegal to modify your brake light setup so you can manually activate them, the illegal part would be using them irresponsibly. Then again, I've gotten a fix-it for having manual reverse lights.

Either way, it's nice that you want to make yourself more obvious to other drivers, but then there's always the quote:
"Make it more idiot proof, I'll make more idiots."

No matter how obvious you make yourself, someone inevitably could be not paying attention, so you might be better off focusing your modding elsewhere.

I don't think your brakelights shining makes much of a difference anyway... I don't pay attention to brake lights, I use depth perception to gauge distance vs. speed. (There are lots of people around with at least one bad brake light, or the sun is in the wrong place, etc.) It works for me.