Can't move shortcut icons on my desktop to different locations on the desktop

Not for me though...

Try clicking the middle mouse button. everything else didnt work for me untili tried that.

I've just recently encountered the same problem. Icons and shortcuts on the desktop won't allow themselves to be "drag and dropped" to any location on the desktop. I made sure the "auto align to grid" was unchecked and ditto with the "auto arrange" options. I've tried the "3 clicks of escape button" suggestion numerous times and nothing is working.  I DID have the mouse roller button problem happen and managed to fix the mouse (Logitech) and can actually scroll in Mozilla Firefox, but not in Google Chrome browser. Google Chrome tabs are also malfunctioning, and all this occurred about the same time. Numerous uninstall and reinstalls have not alleviated the problems a bit. I even tried rolling my PC back to an earlier date, and I've seen no improvement. Everything was fine up until mid-February 2014. I use MS auto update, so I have no idea what the heck is happening, but it sure seems as if this is becoming a huge MS Windows issue. I'm running  Windows 7 Home Premium AO on this particular PC.  Ideas....?

Escape 3x - This worked for me also.  Thanks!!