Interesting reads. Regarding the first, they're talking an issue of scope as you pointed out. 100,000 is clearly a different magnitude than 1.5 million.
The thread that got locked was more about accusing Obama about committing an illegal act with his order than anything else, which probably caused the anger and eventual lock. I suppose it will be up to the courts (now that several states have sued the Obama administration) to decide if his actions were legal or not. Since other orders have addressed immigration in the past, regardless of their scale, I'm not so sure they'll rule he was in the wrong. Time will tell.