Ah, the wonders of modern technology! In a world where healthcare is supposed to be about saving lives, the DOJ, under the ever-watchful eye of Attorney General Nicole Argentieri, seems determined to transform law enforcement into a game of Algorithmic Justice. Why bother with pesky human discretion when we have the perfect marriage of Hank Asher’s and F. Lee Bailey’s brainchildren running the show? Yes, folks, because nothing says “healthcare” like a convoluted mix of healthcare portfolio insurance models à la Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM) and Wall Street’s finest crash-inducing tactics.

You see, the DEA’s new obsession is to get artificial intelligence (AI) to predict opioid sales as if they were forecasting the next recession. Because when you think about fighting an epidemic, naturally, you think about the same types of models that helped cause the 2008 financial meltdown, right? From portfolio insurance to predictive data analytics, it’s all connected now, especially when you throw in the DEA’s DARTS and DICE systems. These tools, probably designed by someone who watched too many reruns of the film Minority Report, aim to “de-conflict” investigations through AI-driven de-identified, real-time data. So now, the DEA doesn’t even need to look at real people. Why worry about nuances when de-identified data can be so much more… sterile?

The DEA’s plan is Michael Scott, “Office level genius”!  The Special Operations Division, the OCDETF Fusion Center, and the ever-mysterious El Paso Intelligence Center (EPIC) will all have their hands in the proverbial AI predictive pie. They’ll sit around their high-tech conference tables, sipping coffee while watching dots on screens that represent supposed opioid-trafficking hotspots. Because when you’ve got data de-identified and thrown into some predictive AI machine, who cares about boots-on-the-ground realities or the fact that actual human lives are involved?

And here’s the cherry on top, they’ll be “sharing real-time data between public health and public safety”. Translation? Federal law enforcement now gets to play doctor. They’ll swoop in with AI models, tools like the CMS Predictive Learning Analytics Tracking Outcomes (PLATO), the Qlarant Artificial Intelligence System, and the National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association’s SIRIS, armed with their digital crystal balls. And don’t forget NBI MEDIC, the Medicare fraud-busting brainchild that now ensures not a single prescription pill escapes unnoticed.

But here’s the real kicker, this is all being done in the name of maximum harm reduction. Who needs local healthcare professionals making informed, human-centered decisions when we’ve got a literal federal task force armed with the latest in predictive data analytics? The DOJ now uses LTCM-style risk management models from the financial world, yes, the ones that brought us the worst financial crises in history, to track pill sales. It’s like they’re trying to apply high-frequency trading algorithms to the drug epidemic, a sell signal goes off, and the feds storm in like it’s Black Monday.

This is what happens when we let AI and data analytics run rampant in spaces that require, you know, actual human judgment. But it’s not just healthcare that’s fallen victim to this insanity. It’s the entire DEA and Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force structure, partnered with federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement, all thinking they can outsmart the opioid crisis with AI software.

Oh, and those quaint little buzzwords like de-confliction, information sharing, and real-time data? They sound fantastic in press releases, don’t they? In practice, it’s probably just a lot of flashy systems talking to each other while the actual cartel drug dealers laugh their way around the next corner. And, of course, this entire operation is de-identified. Because why would law enforcement want to deal with the inconvenient truth of real people in real pain, when numbers and AI models are so much cleaner?

At the heart of it all, it’s like someone mashed together Wall Street’s worst disasters, a touch of cyber-surveillance dystopia, and threw in a bit of Opioid Task Force flair. It’s the DOJ’s answer to the opioid crisis, run it like a hedge fund and hope for the best. What could possibly go wrong?

In the end, let’s all give a standing ovation to Attorney General Nicole Argentieri and the DOJ for bringing Hank Asher’s and F. Lee Bailey’s wildest data-fusion dreams to life. Who needs empathetic, well-informed law enforcement when we can just let AI algorithms lead the charge? And when the next financial collapse or public health debacle hits, we’ll know exactly where to look, right at the glowing screens of the DEA’s AI predictive models.