Get fired up
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A note about your second amendment rights
[Busted Tees]

Superweapons
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Metal Storm takes you down in a hail of gunfire [Link]

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The Navy's Railgun fires a projectile at 5,640 mph—one-third of its potential power. [Link]

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The Cornershot does exactly what you think it does.

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Boeing recently conducted a successful test with an advanced tactical laser mounted on a modified C-130. [Link]

Hacks
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The Rubber Band Gatling Gun takes out co-workers with 40 band per second firepower. [Link]

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Set your phasers to 1080p. [Link]

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Vietnam shotgun bong is one shot, one kill for glaucoma.

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The Doing Da Vinci team builds Leonardo's 11-barreled cannon for the first time.

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The MythBusters paintball gun creates instant artwork with 1100 barrels. [Link]

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The Toilet paper cannon is the ultimate weapon in the prankster's arsenal.

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This water balloon bazooka can fire 12 fluid-filled rounds at once. [Balloon Bazooka]

People Who Shouldn't Be Around Weapons
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Watch and laugh as Poncherello gets tasered.

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Grandma is armed to the teeth, and she's got her eye on your toodles.

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Skinny girls and big guns don't mix.

Toy Guns
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This hacked Nerf Vulcan Chaingun shoots 500 rounds per minute. [Link]

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This fully automatic gun fires Lego ammunition.

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This realistic Halo 3 Plasma Rifle features lights, sounds and recoil. It even vents when overheated. [Link]

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Infrared Duck Hunter brings the classic NES game to life. [Latest Buy]

Weird Guns
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The G.R.A.D 22-cal knife gun is two kills in one. [Link]

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The world's smallest pistol fires 2mm blank pinfire cartridges.

Grand Finale
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Hot girls with guns.

[Image via Flickr; special thanks to Don the Intern for research assistance]

You'll be able to create your own "shows" with 55 different explosions which you can then take anywhere, as the device is designed to be portable—it takes AAA batteries for power and looks fairly diminutive. It'll retail for around $160 when it's released, but that release isn't until August 1st. Releasing a fireworks machine, virtual or no, four weeks after both July 4th and Canada Day is like investing in pumpkins in mid-winter. [Sega via OhGizmo]

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According to a study by the Ponemon Institute and Dell, only 30 percent or so lost laptops are ever recovered. Los Angeles' LAX airport reported having the most lost laptops out of any other airport, with 1,200 going missing every week. The most likely place for you to lose your computer is at security checkpoints and departure gates—so no matter how many beers you downed this weekend, try to be a little more alert while going through those areas, yeah? [Newlaunches]

picture credit: Mike Reger

The flash in the sky is a remnant of a blast 7,000 light-years away in the Lupus constellation. Scientists say that it was the brightest observed supernova in recorded history, and that the light from the explosion could be seen in the daytime for weeks afterward.

The supernova sent a shockwave that traveled outwards at nearly 20 million mph. In the 1960s, radio astronomers first detected the ring of material pushed out by the shockwave. With the latest imagery, released by the Hubble Space Telescope's science team, you can see a gossamer stripe with starlight shining through it—the rocket's red glare indeed.

[Cosmiclog]

Freedom of Speech:

Nothing says "America" like making our political leaders hump in action figure form. Start your own freaky Beltway love triangle involving George and Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton, Uncle Sam, John and Jackie Kennedy, Ronald Reagan and Benjamin Franklin (horn-dog that he was) with these Political Posers action figures. They even threw Jesus in for some totally inappropriate fun. Available for $8.88 each. [Prank Place]

Don't like how Bush is handling things in the White House? Move him into another white house (the kind made from porcelain). You will knock him down a few pegs with a really dirty job. The George Bush toilet brush is available for $16.95. [Baron Bob]

Hillary may be out of the race, but you can remember her campaign for the nation's highest office every time you crack open a walnut. The Hillary Clinton Nutcracker is available for $19.99. [Teptronics via Link]

Knives With Guns In Them:

The G.R.A.D. features a .22 caliber gun hidden in a knife for people who don't think their enemies can ever be too dead. Second amendment! Wooo! Available for $699. [GunsAmerica (how appropriate) and Link]

Huge Grills and Competitive Eating:

It is no wonder that all of the grills out there vying for the title of "world's largest" can be found in the United States. The "Big Taste Grill" is 65 feet of meat-cooking mayhem. With surface area enough for 750 brats at a given time, its max output is 2,500 bph (brats per hour). [Big Taste Grill]

It's not a gadget but come on...competitive eating. If that doesn't scream America I don't know what does. Seriously—they have their own federation, like wrestlers. [IFOCE]

Texas:

Texas knows how to do America right—big and in your face. Case in point, the world's largest video screen is set to go up in the new Cowboys stadium next year. When it is finally installed, it will measure a whopping 11,200 square feet. [Link]

Excess and Laziness:

America is obsessed with acquiring wealth to live lavish, lazy lifestyles. Plumbing service provider Roto-Rooter had America pegged when it ran a promotion last year with a pimped-out toilet featuring a 20-inch LCD, DVD player, XBox 360, iPod with toilet paper stereo docking station, TiVo, Avanti refrigerator with beer tap, a bike pedal exerciser and cup warmer/cooler. [Link]

Over-the-Top Consumerism:

One of the most interesting things about America is that companies will try and sell us anything—and we will be right there, waiting at the check-out lanes with open arms and open wallets.

Star Trek- and MLB-themed urns are a perfect example of this phenomenon. Major companies and franchises put their names on products, and we are so enamored we want to take them to the afterlife. [Eternal Image via Link]

What could be more American than a pair of motion-activated, singing, vibrating breasts? How about a pair of motion-activated, singing, vibrating breasts that you can record your own song on? Indeed, "Jingle Jugs for Life" has an option to record your own message or song. And, in a truly American move, they have added a pre-recorded breast cancer awareness message on each product to keep the feminists at bay. Available for $39.99 (original version) and $49.99 for breast cancer awareness version. [Jingle Jugs and Link]

In the end, I can only hope that this little gadget-filled journey across our great nation has helped you understand just how lucky you are to be an American. So, get out there, cook up some BBQ, drink some beer and shoot illegal fireworks wildly into the air. It's the American way.

We tested five guns, the Super Soaker Sneak Attack 4-Way, the Sizzlin' Cool Steady Stream, the Water Warriors Motorized Tarantula, the Super Soaker Quick Blast and the Banzai Color Stream Blaster.

It should be noted that each gun has its own gimmick that it uses to try to sell you on it while you're wandering the aisles at Toys R Us or Target or wherever it is you purchase your weaponry. By far the most useless was the Color Stream Blaster, which comes with little cartridges of dye that turn the water various colors. This means that after you have a water gun fight, your victims will need to go take a shower and do laundry. That seems like it'd be less fun, not more, so we ignored those things altogether.

Much more fun were the nozzles on the Sneak Attack 4-Way, which let you change the stream by twisting the front of the gun. You could do a thin, powerful stream, a broader misting stream, or fire sideways in either direction. Let me tell you, there are few things more satisfying than saying "Hey, check this out!," pointing the gun off in the distance and then pegging your friend point-blank in the face with a sideways shot. It never, ever gets old.

For the official testing, we first measured the distance that these things can fire compared to their box claims. You never want to be hit by someone you can't hit back because your gun sucks and you're too far away. Surprisingly, the claims of distance made on the boxes was often wildly inaccurate. The Super Soaker Quick Blast, for example, claimed to shoot 25 feet, while we could barely get it firing past 18 feet. The other Super Soaker, on the other hand, claimed a paltry 20 feet, but in practice the thing shot nearly 30 feet (the best of the bunch).

We then wanted to know just how much pain could be inflicted with a shot to the face from each of the guns. Luckily, Summer Intern Dan was there, so we set him up facing the camera and took turns blasting him in the face from a few feet away, recording his reactions. The most painful shot was the Sneak Attack due to its powerful blast, with the Color Stream Blaster and Quick Blast each delivering paltry bursts that he could barely feel.

So what gun do we recommend for your next battle? Well, the Color Blast is a decent gun if you ignore the, you know, color element, and it comes in a two pack, which is nice. However, you feel like you're paying extra for something you won't use, so unless you really want to spray red water at someone, I'd recommend passing. The Tarantula just felt like cheating due to its rechargeable battery that removed the pump action from the mix, and it's a pain to have to rejuice a water gun between uses. It has a huge tank and a decent distance, but for $20 it's definitely the most expensive gun, so it's hard to recommend.

The Super Soaker Quick Blast was definitely at the bottom of our list, with a pathetic stream and a cheap-feeling pump. It doesn't hold much water, either, and whoever got stuck using it during our battle royale was at a serious disadvantage. Avoid it if you can.

The Steady Stream, the cheapest of the guns, was actually our runner up, surprisingly. It doesn't have any real gimmicks to it, but it's a solid gun that fires a good distance and is fun to use, especially for the price.

At the end of the day, however, there was a very clear winner amongst our array of weaponry, and it was the Super Soaker Sneak Attack 4-Way. It shot the farthest, had the most fun gimmick, had a respectable capacity, inflicted the most physical pain on our enemies/intern and was one of the cheapest at under $10. It feels solid in your hands and is just the most fun gun out of all of the models we tested. And really, if a water gun isn't really fun to use, it's doing something wrong.

Get jumped, drink a shot. Get crowned, and your opponent drinks two shots. Lose, and you're drinking all the shots left on the board, buster. A great way to experience the wonders of tequila, alcohol poisoning, or both. Happy Fourth of July. – Charlie White

Shot Glass Checkers [productdose]