Cp is right, it is also much more diffuse of a song, with lots of those cardboard surreal images and mannerisms that sometimes mar his work). There are also the two versions (at least) of the song -- the one on the bootleg album (recorded before the one on Blood on the Tracks) is much less bitter, and to my mind a better song for that.

Technically, I suppose the intriguing part of Idiot Wind is the fact that someone clearly told Dylan that the original meaning of "idiot" in Greek (idiotes) was "a private person, an individual" (people who weren't part of the society were later considered impaired or quirky, hence the later change in meaning). So he plays poetically with the contradictory idea of the "wind that blows where it listeth" (the wind as public force or natural force, and by extension rumour, or as the equivalent of the hot wind of the desert) and the private breath of foolish speech and argument.

The question really is whether the switch to "we" in the last lines is powerful enough to change the whole previous song into a mutual lament -- I don't think so personally. The earlier, softer version almost gets away with it.

yours, Peter T.