You can try squelching channel 1, I think.
<edit>. Meh... Probably not. Maybe there's a way to set up those radio panels to drop those.
You can fix your text bar settings to eliminate salutes (channel 1) but that means you won't see salutes directed at yourself.
Make Salutes a Private message. Done.
NEXT!.... NO WISH FOR YOU! 
If you mean I should send all salutes as a PM, that changes nothing as I can still see everyone else's salutes.
If you mean HTC should make it a PM, that is basically what I'm asking for, only that when you type
.salute "so and so", only "so and so" and you can see it.